Emma's EcoDunes field trip

Emma working with friends to make bricks. Her favorite activity!
Climbing a four story treehouse!
Auroville
Mosquito netting over their beds (i.e. natural ventilation!)
Sleeping quarters. Isn't this the ultimate camp out???

This week Emma spent three days at EcoDunes, near Pondicherry, which is about 2 hours from here. This was the sixth grade field trip. EcoDunes is 30 acres with beachfront inhabited by several species of plants, birds, etc. Vanishing plant life has been replanted here and it features a waste-water treatment plane, solar hot water, natural ventilation (i.e. open huts!) and a demo farm developed through the NGO "Children of the World India". They took hikes, learned how to compost, how to make bricks, bake bread, make pottery and also had time for fun like volleyball and swimming. They also visited Auroville which "wants to be a universal town where men and women of all countries are able to live in peace and progressive harmony above all creeds, all politics and all nationalities. The purpose of Auroville is to realise human unity."

Emma had a great time but was glad to be back home. Here a link to Auroville if you'd like to read more:

http://www.auroville.org/

Fortune-telling is for the birds!

Last weekend we went for dinner at Fisherman's Cove, a lovely resort area about 15 minutes from our house. They had various activities going on so we all had our fortunes read by an Indian who could not speak English, so he enlisted a translator and we started. He took a parrot out of a cage and the bird used his beak to pull cards off of a deck as the fortune teller talked to it. The bird "mysteriously" found the right card for our fortune (when the trainer gave it birdseed). He opened the card and began talking and then consulting a book written in Tamil. The interesting thing was that the cards all have Christian symbols on them. Mine was the Virgin Mary, Emma's was the Nativity, and Zach's was the sacred heart of Jesus----not your traditional Tarot cards!!! Of course, we all had glowing futures. And basically to sum it up, we would all be happy, healthy, wealthy and wise! Hey, this is a tropical resort---not the place you go to hear bad news, right? Anyway, it was fun, but we all agreed, fortune-telling is for the birds, literally!

Emma also had mehindi applied again and in the picture you can see it's a dark pigment that dries and then gets washed off after about 30 min. It will be an orange color underneath.

This is definitely a fun place to go for a family dinner. Right by the beach and we've always had good food and good service.

Puja for New Office

Today we attended the Puja ceremony for the opening of Farid's new office. I had explained this ceremony in another post, but you can also get more info from this link:

http://www.asia.si.edu/education/pujaonline/puja/background.html

Basically it was a ceremony to bless the office before moving in officially next week. They will hold a grand opening ceremony in a few weeks when the entire office complex is completed. Zach and Emma attended and enjoyed seeing this firsthand (and skipping their morning classes!). For me, as a Catholic, there were alot of similarities in the ceremony. Candles and incense were lit, a table decorated with flowers, fruits, images of Hindu gods and ritualistic prayers were chanted by the priests. At the end of the ceremony, everyone offered flowers and put red ashes on their forehead. Then everyone attending was presented with a box of candied nuts. Aferward, we enjoyed breakfast and visited with the employees. We had some U.S. visitors, as well as a Scottish gentleman, who works out of Belgium. One thing about Chennai is the endless opportunities to meet people from all over the world. That is for sure one of the most interesting things about being here. I'm sure Farid feels like he has moved heaven and earth to get this office up and running and today we were all seeing how well it is coming together. The office is very nicely designed and all the employees seem happy to be a part of it.

Postal service in India, are you kidding???

The postal service leaves much to be desired in India. Everyone has heard me explain my address change nightmare, just suffice it to say that we haven't received much mail here. What mail we have received is often torn, damp, shredded... However there are two items in particular that have literally been around the world and back. Zach worked all summer on a shelf that his friends had autographed with messages and artwork which my sister Julie mailed the day we left Kentucky in August. It never arrived in India but did finally make it back to Kentucky in late November, slightly worse for the wear. Also, at about the same time, my other sister Sarah mailed us a set of wind chimes she had given us as a going away gift. It arrived back in Kentucky on Dec. 17 in the condition you see in the picture! When I went to the post office in Kentucky to discuss my change of address situation, the postal supervisor dropped his jaw when I told him that he needed to know that the U.S. postal service is awesome and most people in the U.S. have no idea how lucky we are to have the reliability that we do with our mail in America. He stammered, "Well, thank you ma'am. Usually when somebody wants to talk to me, it's to complain!" I think I made his day...

Home Sweet Home

Our very own welcoming committee--We love you guys!

Zach photographed this view from my parent's farm during one of our cookie baking sessions.

We arrived back in Kentucky for the holidays after four long months. We were greeted with our very own welcoming committee and boy, did it feel good! We spent a very busy but satisfying month visiting family and friends, shopping, dining out at our favorite restaurants, seeing movies, baking cookies and just soaking in the feeling of "home". We were able to attend the Christmas Eve service at St. James and we also did several presentations on India. Zach went to John Hardin social studies classes, Emma and I went to the sixth grade classes at St. James and Payneville Elementary and I got to visit again with all the staff and students at Howevalley. It felt great to be back and do some catching up. We are sure we have the best friends and family in the world! Happy New Year and peace and blessings to you all in 2008!

Emma's December

Emma celebrated her 12th birthday with family and her friend Ahnalies. She shopped for new shoes, beaded ones that are popular here right now, and found several different colors! She also was selected to emcee the Christmas progam and worked hard preparing for the show. Her favorite part was wearing the shiny, metallic tunic (not!) She also played flute during the 6th grade performance. We were very proud of her! Before we headed out for Christmas holidays, she attended the "Snowball" dance with her friends Ali and Ahnalies and she left straightaway to the airport!