April 14, 2012

Claudia had to take a picture of one of the traffic officers :)

 Venkat and I at Shilparamam, The arts and craft village

 Claudia and Venkat at Shilparamam

The night before we left for England, we had dinner at the new hotel Park Hyatt, Hyderabad with Claudia, Jules, Me, Manjusha, Arlo, Veer, Ravi and Jai (Mikey, Rob and Peter are not in the picture)

Jules, Claudia and Rob after dinner

The night we had to fly, we had Venkat and his wife Ancy and their kids Avinash and Chinnu stay at the guest room in our clubhouse, so that he could bring us to the airport at 3am. They had a great time, swimming and going to the playground :)

 We flew business class to London. Mikey took advantage of the room in the isle to play with his cars

 Claudia and Jules sitting comfy in business class :)

April 12, 2012

Claudia's journal: April 12 was another fantastic day except that I don't even know how to begin to put it into words to start to tell you about it.  My mind is racing with everything we saw and did today and the people we met.  Jules kept saying that we will never be able to tell people what we have experienced today (or this whole trip) and he's right!  But I'll try to begin to scratch the surface.  I took more pictures today than any other day in the past four weeks and Jules and I left Miami four weeks ago today.  Venkat drove Jules, Nati and I to his village of Chintapally where he was born which was a two hour drive one way but the journey was amazing!  Venkat stopped any time we asked him (as always) so we got great pictures.  We got to go into a new Hindu temple just before arriving in his village.  Before entering, with Venkat explaining every step, we rinsed our feet at the several faucets outside and left our shoes in the designated areas.  After we had climbed all the stairs there was an area where Venkat stopped at the entrance and gave Nati, Jules and I each a third eye with the red substance on the table.  I have never been in a temple before and it was very large and beautiful and I was shocked to see about 300 people all sitting on the floor. Where were their cars?  Ladies were on the right side and men on the left with a small divider in the middle.  By the time we got back out to our car my "third eye" red dot was dissolving down the bridge of my nose into a red streak!  I think the temperature was over 110 degrees in the sun! 

 Claudia managed to photograph a family of SIX on a motorcycle!!

Women carry anything on their head!

Women selling mangos, they were yummy!!!

 Jules and Claudia in front of the temple of Venkat's village

Venkat giving everyone and himself the third eye

Venkat arranged for me to be blessed in the temple!! I was so honored and blessed!!!!

I had packed a lunch for all of us because Venkat told us that there were no restaurants (or restrooms) suitable for us along the way.  So we took plenty of tissues, too:)  I checked out the restroom on the temple grounds and it had the typical rectangular hole in the floor with a hose nearby on the wall but everything was totally wet in there (that's why they're called wet bathrooms in most of the public toilets) so Nati and I knew we could wait a little longer!

Venkat had told us that his village where he was born and grew up was very poor but we could have never imagined the sights we found.  Such poor people but so happy and beautifully dressed and smiling.  We met lots of Venky's relatives including his uncle and grandmother and many, many friends from his childhood.  Everyone came out to see us and followed us and posed for pictures.  It was so much fun.  I don't think they ever see any foreigners because Venkey said he was 10 before he saw a foreigner for the first time.  It was the greatest experience for us.  Kids of all ages posed for pictures and they all ran after us as we walked around the tiny village.  The three of us got fantastic pictures.  When we left, Venkey's friends and family were all around our car and waved and many held their hands like in a prayer and bowed to thank us.  We were greeted like that, too.  It's a wonderful country with gentle loving people.  Before we left Chintapally Jules, Nati and I all gave Venkat rupees to distribute to his family and they were so grateful.

We looked into the door of his tiny former home where he was born and could see a small room with another doorway.  There was no furniture but a cloth spread out on the floor.  The kitchen and bathroom were outside.  He lost both his parents within just a couple of months when he was 18 years old.  I don't know when he left Chintapally but it might have been when he married.  His wife is a Christian and he said their marriage wasn't arranged but that it was a "love" marriage. 

Venkat and his grandmother

 The house Venkat grew up with his parents and two sisters. The bathroom and kitchen are outside

 Venkat handing out rupees we gave them.

Venkat told us later that he has never before taken any foreigners into his hometown of Chintapally to meet everyone.  We were so honored.  And he said that we were also the first people he took home to meet his wife, son, daughter and family and friends in his village of Saidabad when we were invited there for Ugadi last month for the traditional mango naan bread they made us.  So sweet of Venkat!! 

Next Venkat drove us through fields on a narrow path and when the path got too small due to the overgrown bushes and trees he pulled the car off into the side of an open cotton field.  We saw India today like no other tourists ever get to see.  Venkat wanted us to taste the fermented fruit that they somehow get the juice to drain into containers high up in these normal looking palm trees.  He had been telling us about this for such a long time and we were determined to try it if we had the opportunity.  An Indian man suddenly appeared standing in the path ahead of us and we followed him to a spot to pick up his gear for climbing and then farther through another field where he climbed the tree quickly and brought down the juice that had been draining into the containers high above.  He poured it into leaves for each of us to taste and kept pouring onto your leaf if you wanted to keep drinking.  I just had a taste and it was quite good.  Different from anything I've ever tasted.  He filled a bottle for us to bring home.

There was a village close to Chintapally called Mall, so we were very amused, and the streets were full of tiny, rustic stores and eateries, none of which we could use, but they looked like the familiar ones that had lined the streets of all the villages we had passed through this past month.  Then we stopped on the way home at a school that Venkat knew, where children were outside close to the steps of the building, and Nati and I used the "restroom" which is nothing like you can imagine.  There was a row of permanent outhouse type buildings and each housed a hole in the cement filled with leaves and garbage in it.  I don't know when they had been used last.  Everything was covered in a half inch of red dust.  Nati and I had to go so badly by this time because it was 3pm and we had left at 10:30am so we could do this:)  The guys had gone along the desolate roadways several times and were waiting out at the car for us.  Nati and I had a great laugh and said it might have been easier to go in the field like the guys but Venkat said we couldn't have done that. That wouldn't be "ladylike".  That only guys are allowed to do that:)

The last few days of the 4 week stay of Poppy and Claudia, we were driverless :)

The part of town where Venkat, our driver lives, is under curfew as of April 8. The curfew was imposed after communal clashes between arabs and hindus, following the desecration of a Hindu place of worship. 

I took advantage of the situation and decided to drive myself. It was my first time driving in India and I actually enjoy it :)

We had such an amazing month with Claudia and Jules, sad it's coming to an end, but excited about our week in Windsor, UK!!!!

April 10, 2012

April 10, 2012

Today I found out from CBS4, the local news station in Miami, that Mrs. Cassie (Mikey's teacher in Coral Springs) had won the best teacher award that I had nominated her for!! I was sooooo excited!!! If anyone deserves it, it's her!!!

Here is the link of the broadcast:

Coral Springs Educator First Recipient Of CBS4's "Love My Teacher" « CBS Miami

March 31, 2012

On March 31, 2012 we travelled to Agra, India. First we had to fly from Hyderabad to New Dehli on SpiceJet. Then we met a driver from The ITC hotel who was going to drive us to Agra. It was a 6 hour drive!! All in all, a 12 hour travel day!! We were glad we made it to the hotel. Driving in India is pretty crazy and of course you have to take all these back roads, there is no highway :)

It was a fun drive. We saw lots of things: wild monkeys and even an elephant!!!!

The hotel was amazing. We had a very nice suite with our private butler!!! The hotel also has an ATV course, a mini golf course and two swimming pools. And they are home to the largest spa in Asia!!!

The next morning, our driver Vinod took us to the parking lot of the Taj which is located about a mile from the site to prevent pollution. We met our personal Taj Guide and we chose to travel on a camel and cart to the Taj Mahal, since it was such a hot day. But the wheels of the cart were not round and it ended up being a very uncomfortable ride :)  

Like all places in India, there is security and there are separate lines for men and women. The security guard wanted to know where I was from and when I told him I lived in Hyderabad he wanted to know if I was married :)

It had been a longtime dream of Claudia to see the Taj Mahal and she got so emotional when she finally saw it.  We took loads of pictures and our guide even asked people to step out of the way so we could take better pictures. Rob had Mikey on his shoulders and they seemed to be more of a 'photo op' than the Taj. All the Indians wanted to pose with them. It was so funny!!!!!

There was another 'photo op' where a bench was sitting at a perfect spot in front of the Taj and there was a sign that it was for Indian people only. But since we are Indian residents now, we were able to take a picture there.

After spending a few hours at the Taj Mahal, it was good to get back into the air conditioned, luxurious hotel that was like an oasis and we had a late lunch finishing around 3pm.  Claudia was so excited she got her meal served in a huge white dome over the plate.

After lunch, both Claudia and I had a typical Indian Ayurvedic massage. (Claudia's first massage ever!!) The massage was performed by two therapists working in perfect harmony on each side of the table.  The four hands felt like a choreographed dance.  They used a lot of warm oils.  The Taj Mahal is built very symetrically and the massage reminded me of the symetry.

The next day we hung out in the hotel. We went for an ATV ride (Mikey wanted to, but he was too little); we went swimming and at night we went to a play about the history of the Taj Mahal. 

On Tuesday morning early we left for our long ride back to Dehli. We took our SpiceJet flight back to Hyderabad

 And we were very happy to be back home :)

What a fun adventure!!!!