Home.

I'm leaving for Delhi tomorrow and will be meeting my Dad on Monday night to travel throughout Northern India! Two more weeks and I'll be back on American soil wearing red, white, and blue for the next 6 months! I'm not sure I'll have internet access for the next couple of weeks, but I'll post pictures of my last trip when I return home. See everyone in America!!

Inventive II...

More pictures of things being transported on bikes.

Inventive...

One of the most shocking, and now most normal, things I see everyday is how goods are transported in India. Space is limited and motorbikes are used by almost every family. It isn’t abnormal to see a family of 4 sometimes 5 riding down the road on a single motorbike. I’ve become so accustom to this it seems almost silly to have less than 3 people on a bike. Why would you waist 10 cents for a rickshaw when you can all just pile on a bike? I’ve also seen some pretty crazy things being transported on motorbikes: computers, doors (yes a front door was seen), coconuts, tricycles, etc. I’ve tried explaining it to people back home and everyone just wants pictures. So that is my goal for the next couple of weeks. Wish me luck…these pictures are difficult to get as I’m usually playing frogger with my life crossing the road or speeding along on a city bus. Here is your first picture…enjoy.

Meet Jack...

I have a nephew!!!!! I was able to meet him over Skype as he slept in his other aunt's lap the entire time. He even yawned during the call...I think my heart melted when I witnessed this adorable act. Four more weeks and I can snuggle with him!!

Hampi and Bangalore...

Four of us took off for the weekend with no real plans in mind. We had train tickets to Hampi and Bangalore, but no real plan in mind. Thanks to Lonely Planet we had some great suggestions on where to stay and places to visit throughout our trip.. Hampi is an old ruined city with lots of monkeys crowding the streets looking to harass tourist. Luckily, we all came through with only one incident that left us all running from a monkey wanting to share Pam’s snack of carrots. The carrots were lost, but we were saved without being attacked. We also managed to rent some motor bikes to cruise around Hampi. The bikes proved to be easy to acquire with me ‘passing’ the driving test with flying colors (I only had to verbally confirm that I had driven a motorbike and had a license for one in the US…neither of which is true, but I was still handed the keys).
We then headed out on a train to Bangalore where we met up with Jim, an American we had met on a previous train ride. Jim and the rest of the group hung around Bangalore all day being dragged around by our ‘tour guide’, which was a man that had a sketchy van. When offered a ride, we immediately jumped in this van and set off on our day of adventure. The highlight of the day wasn’t the beautiful gardens or crowded market, but a BAGEL SHOP!!! That is right!!! In the middle of the city we found a bagel shop where I had my first bagel and cream cheese in months. I was also able to visit a McDonalds!!!! I didn’t my get my usual quarter pounder (remember no beef), but settled with a chicken sandwich, fries, and fountain pepsi. Life is good.

The Nature Whisperer...

I can’t stand The Nature, but I’m learning to love it bit by bit. I’m even considering going camping when I come home much to the joy of many people (Martha Sue and LBJ). However, it still takes time to get use to the idea. This weekend I was in The Nature and loved every minute of it. Well, almost every minute of it. Allison, Bryce, Jacqi, and I drove up to Munnar (don’t worry we hired a driver) to visit the famous tea plantation. It was a gorgeous ride and we even stopped to look at waterfalls and wild monkeys. It was so cute to see little baby ones clinging to their mothers as they crossed the street. After we left the monkeys, we traveled further up the mountain to our cottage to stay the night. Our driver took us on a ‘short hike’ (5km), up the whole way, to a farm where we played with a puppy named Julie and watched one of the farm hands ride a bull. It was really funny and I had a great time petting the animals. The next day we went driving around taking pictures of the tea plantations and shopping in Munnar. I also tempted a dragonfly to land on my finger, but didn't have my camera on me; however, Allison will vouch for me!

Blah...

I feel like every blogger reaches this point. “I’m almost done, I have nothing else to say.” Well, persistent blog readers I have reached that point. Can you believe I only have 6 more weeks left at Rajagiri!!! I leave here on November 5th and will be celebrating Diwali in Delhi with some roomies and a couple of new friends. My Dad will then be flying over to travel throughout Rajasthan for a week and then I’m home to celebrate my favorite holiday….Thanksgiving!!! I cannot believe I’ve been living here so long and been able to experience so much in such a short about of time. My friends and I have planned a jammed packed 6 weeks full of weekend trips throughout Southern India. I promise to post pictures and have funny stories. In other exciting news my sister, Jennifer, will be having her baby boy next month!!! I’m so sad I cannot be there to hold him, but the moment I get off the plane in America I’m heading to Philly to hold my little nephew!
This past weekend we took another boat trip on the backwaters with Jen (Jacqi's best friend who came to visit) and had a blast. We all just had a good time hanging out and telling funny stories from college. We are heading to Munnar this weekend to visit a tea plantation and hang out with some elephants. I'll post pictures when I get back!


(Jen and I practicing some yoga moves)

Backwaters...

This past weekend several of us took a boat tour of the Backwaters of Kerala. It was amazing and relaxing. We had the entire boat to ourselves! I was able to fit in 2 small naps throughout the day and take a ton of pictures.

Halfway...

I’m a little over halfway done with my time here in India. I was laying on the floor of my apartment thinking over all the things I have come accustom to this past few months. For example, today I came home from field and was too exhausted to take a shower. However, I was too gross to get in my bed…logically I just took a nap on the floor of my room and didn’t think twice about it. Another thing I did today was to eat fish with little tiny bones. As I was picking through the fish I came across the fish eggs…and again thought nothing of it as I picked around the bones and eggs with my fingers. If you know anything about me I rarely eat anything on a bone unless it is ribs that my mother has cooked, but there I was eating fish on a bone. Again while in the village today I was taken to a Chinese fishing net and of course I climbed on the bamboo bridge (it was cracking as I was crossing it) and thought nothing of it. It was beautiful to overlook the water and then crawl even further out onto the net as it jutted out over the river. I continued to lay there after my nap on the floor and think about things that I thought were so shocking or strange before, but have become so common it seems silly to even write about. For example, if you are on a bus you are expected to push and shove your way to a seat, but the minute a woman gets on with a baby you are expected to offer your seat. Also, it is perfectly normal to see a family of 4 sometimes 5 packed onto a motorbike. It has amazed me the amount of things one can carry on a single motorbike: doors, chairs, huge bags of rice, tiny babies, large stacks of newspaper, computer monitors, and even bushels of bananas. Children insist on helping me cross the street by holding my hand. I am perfectly able to cross a street on my own, but they won’t let me do it. If the power goes out while taking a shower you just try to remember where you put your shampoo and hope for the best. Also, before getting the in shower you do a quick check to make sure no spiders or lizards have found there way in, but if they have you just shoo them away. Also, not really scared of spiders anymore except for the really, really big ones. By big I mean the ones that are bigger than my hand; I’m not sure I’ll ever we okay with those monsters. Setting aside an entire morning to tackle your laundry seems perfectly normal here. You just put on your iPod and start washing those clothes with yours hands. Money is also a funny thing over here. I will argue and argue with someone over 10 rupees (about .20 cents) and not pay for anything if I can help it. I will take a bus instead of a rickshaw and then walk 3 extra km to save $2. I also brought a fan over from American and since the beginning of the trip this fan has lost 2 blades and started to make a funny noise. Instead of buying another one (I’m sure I could get one for $3) I ‘fixed’ it by tying some string around the top of the fan. I am that girl now and I don’t care.

(don't panic...thanks)

(baby fan)

(Sister Medona playing on Chinese fishing net)

Did that just happend?

Varkala. It’s a beautiful beach south of where I live and the destination of my very adventurous weekend. Well, the weekend wasn’t so adventurous, but getting there and back is another story. Jacqi, Allison, and I began our little spontaneous adventure with hesitation at 6am on Friday…I think we all just wanted to crawl back into bed and forget the whole thing, but we figured you only live once. We packed all of our stuff into the bookbags and set off. Getting to the train station was the usually deal: leave our house, cross some train tracks under the bridge (avoiding large puddles), hike up a hill (no stairs), catch a bus, push and shove to get a seat (it’s a 45 minute bus ride), and stare back at anyone who is staring at you because you are clearly not Indian. Typical day. We get off the bus stop and walk the 2 km to the bus stop because there is no way we splitting a .40 rickshaw between the 3 of us. Still a typical day. We buy ‘general seating’ because it’s only 5 hours to Varkala and it seems silly to pay more than a $1 for the train ride. We begin to comment that maybe God will smile on us this weekend for being spontaneous and living in the moment. We were dead wrong…..
Our train comes and we are all of a sudden in the middle of a mad rush with others. Where this huge crowd came from is unknown to me because moments before there were only 3 of us on that platform. We come to the shocking conclusion that we are going to have to stand like sardines the entire way. We are all looking at each other with sadness and despair, but all is still okay. Then ‘it’ happens. I’m standing closest to the ‘doors’ of the train while Jacqi and Allison are with our bags in the train car (note: there are people EVERYWHERE). There is something being yelled in a language that I don’t understand and everyone is murmuring; clearly something is going on that we don’t know about. All of a sudden a man pushes past me from another car. This man is probably the most disheveled man I have ever seen. I won’t go into detail, but what Allison whispers as he pushes past her clearly sums up the description, “Jacqi, I think he’s crazy.” A few seconds later I look over Allison’s shoulder and see a cop coming towards the ‘crazy’ man. The cop is yelling what I can only guess is “Get off the train you crazed lunatic!”, but when the man refuses all hell breaks loose. Allison, Jacqi, and I are trapped beside this crazed man and he is being CANED by the cop. We are about 6 inches from the caning and I think we all had fears of being caught in the caning crossfire so we just tried to protect our heads. Jacqi and I manage to get further away from it as Allison continues to be trapped nearer to the caning. The cops manage to shove/cane the crazed man outside the train and we rush back to our bookbags (they were left when the caning began). Allison began to tear up then hysterically laughing, Jacqi just cried, and I E.S.D. (Emotionally Shut Down). I looked at the floor for a bit and then just got my bookbag to sit in the middle of the train floor. I think if we could have gotten off that train at that moment we would have, but it was impossible with all the people. The rest of the train ride wasn’t much better, but that was the last caning we saw that day. We eventually got seats after some pushing and shoving. Getting off the train was pretty funny; we literally had to leap off the train as it was moving…a little scary.

However, when we arrived at the beach we were amazed. The hotel was perched on a cliff overlooking the Arabian Sea and is one of the most gorgeous things I’ve seen in India. We spent the next 2 days drinking beer out of teapots (many places don’t have license thus serving in teapots), taking pictures, hiking down the cliff to look at the water, watching dolphins, observing the local mongoose, and eating great food. However, most of the weekend we would look at each other and state “Did that just happen?”

(local mongoose)

(teapot beer)

A Visitor...in India!?

The past couple of weeks have been the best so far!! Caitlin flew over to visit me!!! We went to Goa and had a fabulous time together. Upon arriving in the hotel room, I promptly took the first warm shower I’ve had in over 2 months!! I cannot describe how overjoyed I was to have her here. We were able to visit a spice plantation, ride and wash an elephant (I could basically drive an elephant now because I do it so often), shop at markets (Caitlin had to take a Xanax for those trips), drink beers at beach huts, visit an old fort, chase cows on the beach (she wanted to photo document each one in Goa...and I think she came pretty close), and we even celebrated her birthday!!! It was funny to see her react when people kept coming up to us asking if they could take pictures with us. I think at one point we had a group of 40 surrounding us….we are a pretty big deal. I feel rejuvenated after getting to spend so much time with such a fun and wonderful person who took the time to fly all the way over here to visit. I have some really fun trips coming up including a beach trip this weekend to Thirvananthapuram...which I can pronounce.

All pictures were taken by Caitlin








(just chasing come cows)


(celebrating Cait's birthday with our new friends)

Fight or Flight...

It all started with a roach...
Several of us were hanging out in our bedroom when a roach flew into the room. We (Jacqi, Allison, and I) were all screaming and going on. Well, Allison, Jacqi, and I high tail it out of the room with screams and pushing one another out of the way. I may have pushed Jacqi into a wall. Do you know the saying ‘Fight or Flight’? Well, it is said that everyone during a time of extreme crisis has either ‘Fight or Flight’ responses. People are born with it; you can’t change or help it. Well, the 3 of us responded in the ultimate Flight. I was the first one out of the room due to the push past of Jacqi, she was then right behind me, with Allison trailing behind us. I ran into the ‘common area’ and then something just came over me. This emotion of ‘I have to save them, I’m their only hope’. …. I had this barbaric ‘Fight’ response all of a sudden. I grabbed the nearest flippy flops on the ground and 180 back into the danger. I literally ran into Allison full force, shoved her out of the way, and dove at the roach crawling across the floor. I missed the first time and it was scurrying under my bed; so dove on my belly to kill the formidable foe. The girls erupted in a cheer and pats on the back while I hunched over in nausea and after shocks of fear. I had to sit down after such an adrenaline rush and practiced some depth breathing exercises while I was continuously affirmed by the roomies over and over. Allison, graciously disposed of the dead carcass, but all was not over. After the emotional situation we (Allison, Jacqi, and I) decided we needed “Shark Week 2010: Air Jaws’ episode. We crowded in our common area, set up my laptop, and speakers (these speakers were stolen out of an office at Rajagiri and are from circuit 1989). To get a visual, the laptop was on the table and the speaker wire was strung across the walkway to plug in the only outlet in the room. It was dark by then and we were about 30 minutes into episode. All of a sudden from another room we hear “HOLY #$(@”. We all jumped up (minding the speaker cord) and rush into the other room. ‘There’s another one!’ Gabby screams. The ‘Flight’ response was back in full force .Out of the room runs Jacqi (who is climbing over the chairs), Allison (headed right for the speaker wire plugged into my laptop), and myself. Allison is full speed ahead towards the wire and the ultimate destruction of my laptop when I grab her around the waist and some how manage to unplug the wire. I let her go, safely saving my laptop, and she runs into the corner (afterwards when recapping the story to her she states “What!!? I had no idea’…her ‘Flight’ response was in full force). I ran after her as Jacqi (remember she is leaping over chairs) is safely in our corner. The roach (not by me) is killed with a hairbrush and all is over in a matter of seconds. We all had a good laugh about ‘surrendering to India’ (our new life motto here).



(I drew this to celebrate Shark Week)

Baby Victories...

There aren't many things that make me excited in India. I'm daily fighting for my life with the Nature, trying to forge for food to sustain life, or attempting to communicate with the locals. However, we all joke about 'baby victories'. A 'baby victory' is very small thing that makes our day. I don't mean 'makes our day' for a moment, I mean 'makes our day and we keep talking about it for weeks victory'. I’m not sure why we call it a ‘baby victor’, but it just sounds cute. An example would be Bebi (our house mom) killing a huge spider and then exclaiming "SPIDER NO LIFE!!!", not getting caught in a monsoon, getting off at the proper bus stop, eating a decent meal, or even having a conversation with someone and understanding the content. These are all ‘baby victories’ in my life in India.

However, a ‘baby victory’ that comes almost everyday from someone in the States is mail. I want to thank all of you for your postcards, letters, packages, cards, and little notes. Biju, the guy in charge of us, joked with me today that he is going to start charging me handling fees because I’m getting so much mail (he really just wants American chocolate). I just wanted to take a moment and thank everyone!! The Janer for all the food, Jennifer (John, Spencer, and baby Carty) for all the countless hilarious letters, Caitlin for all your many packages (I cannot wait to see you in 2 weeks), Suzanna for your cute card, Ryan for my drinks and new pint glass (I drank this afternoon for you), Philip for your bootleg copy of my favorite movie (I still haven’t gotten it yet, but what do you expect with the two countries we are living in), Dancing Mandy for your wedding invitation, and Lyndsey for your fun card!!!

Thank you all so much for everything!!


(thank you Ryan)

Playgrounds in India...

Things are picking up in India. I've begun doing research for 'best practices' for human trafficking victims and visiting several safehouses for children rescued from brothels. It's very sad to see some of these little girls and knowing what they have seen and been through, but to see their smiling faces is wonderful!

Most of my days are now filled with research and traveling to different places, but today we stayed on campus to play around. Jacqi and I found this cute little playground on campus and decided to take advantage of it. I will say this was the best playground I've seen thus far in India...I'm still on the hunt rest assure.

Clearly...

The other day our group decided to visit the city of Fort Kochi to eat a decent dinner and have a few drinks. Fort Kochi is known for the famous Chinese fishing nets which are amazing to watch. However, we were more interested in acquiring food so we didn’t stop to take pictures. We found a fun place right outside the boat ferry where we could sit outdoors and order a feast of food/drinks.

(Knock Out Beer)

Menus are typically in English, but is quiet interesting to read some of the descriptions of “American Food”.

(thank goodness that was clarified)

We all had great time eating, drinking, and relaxing by the water. Tomorrow we will be celebrating July 4th complete with fireworks and Pizza Hut at a friend's apartment. I'm sure it will prove to be an amazing time and I promise to post pictures!!

Outrageous…

After a truly exhausting day of sitting around doing nothing yesterday, Jacqi and I decided to take it easy and read/sleep on this hot, humid Sunday. We went to Oberon Mall to eat some delicious (makes me sick afterward) pizza. To get to this amazing haven we have to take a death trap for a once fearful, but now enjoyable ride.

(actual view of a passing death trap from a death trap)

The entire cost of a one-way trip costs 60 rupees ($1.27). However, on our return trip the ‘cabbie’ tried to swindle us for an outrageous 90 rupees!!!! Jacqi and I proceed to argue with him over (if you can’t do the math) .43 cents. That’s right, I’ve become ‘that’ girl who argues over .43 cents. I’m totally fine in the States paying outrageous amounts of money for the Office Season 7 (HD), but I will not be had over .43 cents.

(picture of a 'nice' death trap complete with tarp to keep out monsoon)