Tropical Cyclone Nisha

We survived tropical cyclone Nisha! The storm stalled over Chennai for about 3 days and dumped lots of rain. We mopped up lots of water around windows because even though they were shut, they are not tightly sealed and the wind blew it straight in. I think I used every towel in this house to soak up and mop with and I'm still washing towels today! However, I'm not going to complain as many people suffered severe flooding. Our drivers who had driven to the house on motorcycles were soaked from the waist down. Here are some of the sights we saw on the road this week:

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Photo Contest

Every year one of the relocation companies holds a photo contest for expatriates. This year there were over 500 entries and Zach and I decided to put our photo skills to the test and enter some pictures. I've been taking a 10 week photography course and Zach had a year long course in school. Even though he didn't win this year, it was actually he who inspired me to take the course. (Thanks Zach!) Surprisingly, I did win one of the judges choice awards (from the Japanese consulate general!!!) Photo contests are very arbitrary anyway and I actually preferred another picture over the winner. I also won a drawing for a 2 night homestay somewhere in India! So it was a good experience overall. I'm taking the prints they made of Zach's pics from the Taj Mahal and making a photo collage to have framed.

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Thanksgiving in Chennai

It's hard being away during the holidays but several of us got together this year to put together a Thanksgiving dinner. Thanks to the Vannette's generous use of their house, Lisa's donation of the turkey, Betsy's expertise with cooking the turkey and lots of other people bringing wonderful food, I think we pulled off a successful and delicious Thanksgiving! Only two weeks till Christmas break!

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Terror Attacks in Mumbai

As I'm sure you've all seen on the news this weekend, Mumbai was under siege by terrorists with 100+ people dying and many more injured. Mumbai is several hours by car and a short flight from Chennai which was quiet during this assault. The only difference was we saw very increased security in some places, which we welcomed. We tend to not go to large public places anyway but still I'll have to admit targeting hotels where Americans stayed is a little unnerving. But putting it in perspective, it could happen ANYWHERE AT ANY TIME! While this happened to go on in India while we're living here, there were terror threats in New York subways. So I guess we just all have to pay attention, pray for peace and trust in God to protect us.

Thanks to everyone who emailed or called to check on us. It's nice to know we're loved :)

Emma's Class on Safari

Emma's 7th grade class went to King's Sanctuary at Nagarhole National Park this past week for safaris and other team building activities. They toured the Tibetan monastery of Sakya and the Mysore Palace. They traveled by train and bus and toured the park in jeeps. They arrived back after a night train ride and were ready for a nap!

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Maldives, take me away...

We spend our Diwali holiday in the Maldives, or heaven on earth as we called it! We mainly relaxed on the beach, took walks around our island and snorkeled and ATE! We had never snorkeled so it was fascinating for us. We saw baby sharks and tropical fish (since our aquatic knowledge is limited--we often referred to Finding Nemo characters in the Disney movie to describe what we saw underwater!) Since the Maldives may disappear underwater if global warming continues, and the newly elected Maldivian president wants to buy land in other countries such as Sri Lanka and India in case they have to relocate their citizens, we were thankful to have this opporunity and hopeful that it never comes to that.

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OBAMA!!!

Well, history was made this week with Barack Obama's victory. I was so excited and moved to tears by his speech which signaled that maybe there is light in the midst of all the chaos that been surrounding us. I just hope and pray he can achieve the things he has promised. Of course, he won't deliver them all, but I really liked the fact that he was asking all of us to be part of the solution. It will be an interesting four year journey.

Since Farid's family was visiting, we celebrated with an OBAMA cake and watched his speech again. I wanted Zach and Emma to realize the importance of this day. It was a fun evening!