So...it's been a couple of weeks since the trip to India and I still haven't updated the blog. Well, I've been busy. I'm moving to Fort McMurray, Alberta in a couple of weeks and that has kept me pretty busy...I've been interviewing and now I'm in the packing stage. Yep, busy.

Instead of doing the original update I had intended I am going to select every 25th picture from the trip and tell you about it. OK? Great! Let's do it.

 Picture # 25 taken in Chennai. Typical side street view.

 And this is picture #26...cause I liked it so much. This lady sells fruit at a small market located under an over pass in Chennai.

 And this was from the market...when I started to try and pick out the 25th, 50th and 75th images. I saw all these great images that were not going to be selected and felt that they also needed to be shown...so there goes that idea. This is the 'powder'? that is used to make the dots on peoples foreheads. It is a religious statement and apparently different religions have different dots and different meanings.

 This little bowl is full of powders that are used to make the marks outside the homes on the ground. They make beautiful patterns and the more colourful, the more elaborate the design generally means there is a celebration of some sort going on inside the house.

 Happy smiles from one of the vendors at the market. His wife asked me to take his picture and he was all smiles as I did so.

 This gentleman didn't seem as happy to have his photo taken but I liked how quietly he sat there when everyone was talking and shouting and laughing.

Mmm, fresh produce. I could wander through the markets forever looking at the lovely piles, baskets and groupings of veggies, spices, etc.

Arrived back in Canada safe and sound. Pictures and updates over the next few days.

We are on R&R. Things went so well. I have so many pages of notes and thoughts in my head to share...but it will need to wait. We leave in a few minutes for supper and I don't want to be late. After an afternoon of sun, surf and sand my stomach is grumbling. I have a almost 7 hour lay over in Montreal on Monday and can't decide what to do..maybe I will run into Montreal if I am feeling up to it.

For now let me say. Build was successful and would I lead a team again--YES.

I just looked at my finger nails and they are still dirty. I took one of the longest showers of my life tonight and yet I'm still dirty. Today was another great day at the build site but what a dirty group we were.

The thunder showers we had over the weekend continued into the early hours of this am. By the time we were on the road and heading to the village it was just raining. There was a lot of rain over the weekend which of course meant a lot of mud at the build site. By 9am I was up to my ankles in mud, my shirt and pants were soaked through but I was feeling great. We were able to pour the foundation for a home today and boy does that feel good. They started the next layer of the foundation and it should be ready for us to fill with sand/dirt/rocks tomorrow.

Tuesday--tomorrow we will be doing 'unskilled' labor. We aren't sure how much more unskilled it can get. lol. The village is having an annual religious ceremony tomorrow and the home owners won't be working with us so we were told we'd do unskilled work. It should be a good day...and a little rain would be ok again too. Keeps us cool.

It is hard to believe that we are on the downward side of the trip. By Friday we are finished and getting ready for our R&R. We work hard at the site and while it may seem like a lot of down time trust me...we are breaking our backs and working like dogs. The homeowners and Habitat are very pleased with the progress we have made...and continue to make.

I better go and get ready for supper. The team doesn't know it yet but we are heading out to a rather la te da kind of place for supper. We will certainly not be dressed for it...and hopefully they seat us downwind of the other patrons but it should be a good time.

The ability to comment was my error. When I set up the blog I didn't check allow anyone to comment. You should all be able to leave messages now--gmail account or not.

oops.

Random thoughts from India.

Today was a cultural day for the GV team. In the morning we drove to the Chidambaram Temple. (Google it!). It was amazing. Last trip we went to many temples in one day and they were all very impressive in their own way. This temple is HUGE. They told us the priests own about 40 acres of land and a lot of it is the 4 entrances and inner temple grounds. Very impressive. One part that we couldn't go into but could view through a gate was this 'hall' with 999 columns. Each one intricately carved. Amazing.

After the temple we went to Pichavaram which is an eco tourism site for a ride through the Mangrove forest. It was beautiful and it felt great to be out on the boat enjoying the salt water spray, gentle rocking of the waves and laughter of my team mates.

It was a 2 hour drive to the temple and then about a 2.5 hour ride back from Pichavaram so it made for a full 9 hour day. I napped for a bit on the way back. :)

Supper at the hotel again tonight. It was buffet night. I think I prefer the buffet as not only do we normally have an incredible selection to choose from; 1 or 2 chicken dishes, usually a fish and a lamb/goat or two, a couple of vegetarian dishes, a couple of chinese style dishes, 2 rice dishes, sauces, 2 soups, dal and a paneer of some kind....plus the salads and don't forget the dessert table. WOW. Ice cream, fresh fruit, a different custard every night, a ghee sweet of some kind, cake, etc. Yep, hard to go hungry here.

The restaurant posts the name of each dish and they have a red or green square on the top corner, non-veg or veg. They also put the spice level at the bottom spicy, medium, light or less. Too cute. Even the sugar packages have a green square on them marking them as vegetarian.

They have done a set menu for us a couple of times where they serve us. The food is always so good....but there is way to much. Last night for instance we had 4 appetizers, a soup, then a chicken dish with veggies and mashed potatoes followed by a dal, a paneer, a curry of some kind, naan and then dessert. Unfortunately by the time we got to dessert our table had gone from 12 to  6 and only 2 stayed for dessert. \We felt bad about potentially wasting the food, but it was almost 10pm and I didn't think I needed any sugar in my system at that point. Our waiter looked disappointed when we left.

Breakfast is buffet style and they always have the same menu but there is so much to choose from you can have something different almost every single day and there is a cook who will do eggs to order. I have been having boiled eggs and toast. I ate the idly for a few mornings and then stuffed dosa a few other mornings but I really just want a bagel with peanut butter and some of my stinky tea at the moment.

We had lunch out today and along with the dal, sweet n sour chicken, rice, roti there were french fries. It certainly was interesting. the little cup of  ice cream at the end was delishous and I think everyone devoured theirs.

Tomorrow is a quieter day. We are heading out to Auroville which is only about 10km outside of Pondicherry. It is a large, well known ashram. We will learn about life at the ashram and then walk the grounds before returning to Pondicherry. The team has the afternoon off to shop, sit by the pool or do whatever they like. I am going to head out on my own and have some me time. I told a few people at supper that I'm taking the afternoon off. I will likely head out for a glass of fresh lime soda--sweet and then some shopping. Sari anyone???

I should get off the computer and get some of my mess put away. My side of the room is a bit messy tonight. It looks as though my suitcase exploded.

To those of you who have sent emails--thanks. I may not always get to respond but I am certainly reading them.

Life is a grand bazaar.

Thursday was a great day at the build site and an interesting one...oh, I forgot to tell you a joke..

How many Habitat volunteers does it take to change a flat time on the bus?
Answer--quite a few.

Our bus blew a tire on Wednesday night as we were heading back to Pondicherry. No biggie, my only complaint was that we blew a tire in a spot with no stores a few more km down the road and we would have been in front of the antique stores I see every day as we drive by.

The whole tire change took about 10 minutes but what a dangerous thing for the ones changing it. Laying in the middle of the road having traffic whiz by just inches from where they were. I'm glad I was standing on the side of the road as far away from the traffic as I could get.

Thursday. We were delayed in leaving that morning due to some political tension in the village. Not over us or the build but over the election that has just finished here. After about 1/2 hour we were on our way. The drive is nice and only about 40 minutes long, at some points you can see the Bay of bENGAL.As we turned off the East Coast highway and onto the village road the bus stopped. there was a man walking towards us shaking something at us and talking about going to the police about something. \the driver turned the bus off. we sat and watched/listened. he kept walking and we started to drive down the road again. \village drunk apparently out for a rant.

we started working on a 4th house and half the team moved bricks while the other half sifted sand and passed mortar. some helped with the rebar for another home and everyone was having a great day. after our late start we took a late break which ended at 12noon and then had to stop at 1pm for lunch. Our lunch comes out in the bus with us each morning and the temperatures wouldn't be ok for eating if left longer. After lunch we had a tour of some of the rice paddies where the villagers work, some peanut fields and generally received a better understanding of what they do all day. I can only imagine how difficult it must be to work in that hot sun day after day after day, year after year.

It was a very informative session and when we finished we had time to hang out with the village kids, take some pictures and get to know the people we are building for a bit better. Then it was back to Pondicherry for the evening. We had a great night of celebrating a birthday for one team member and shared some champagne and laughs.

Today, Friday was massages and then shopping. I enjoyed both. I will write more when I get back from the trip. I am taking notes here and there...but I am finding that as the team leader I do not have a lot of free time to sit and think. The team is great but I am trying to be available to help and assist and take people places when they are unsure of where to go....so my blogging time is limited.

Tomorrow we are off to a 4th century temple, a boat ride in a mangrove and a very long 4 hours on the bus.

Hope all of you in PEI are enjoying the snow I hear you received. We got a sprinkle of rain today but overall...hot and sunny. I'm trying to get a tan but so far it isn't going very well. Maybe by the end of next week.