Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!  We had a fun thanksgiving, baking and cooking all day. Or house helper hasn't shown up for a week, but she miraculously showed up today in time to do my dishes all day long and it was NICE!  She also did all the cleaning so when our guests arrived the house was clean.  I could get used to this.

Finding thanksgiving food here was a challenge, no cranberries or cranberry sauce was anywhere to be found in the city.  However, we did find a turkey...
 

homemade rolls

french beans

mashed potatoes

 a family favorite, apple slices

and of course pumpkin pie

I'm not sure if you can tell, but the celery here is very skinny, about the size of Zoe's baby fingers

 I also made stuffing and sweet potatoes, which I forgot to take pictures of.  We had to roast the turkey in our microwave, it has a convection oven option, in a big glass bowl because I didn't bring any pots big enough to fit a turkey. Indian food is usually many small dishes that cook over high heat very quickly, so finding a roasting pan here was impossible.  We also couldn't find evaporated milk or ground spices for the pumpkin pie, so I evaporated some milk on the stove and ground the spices fresh-Yum!  We made what we had work, and all in all I think it was a success.  We had a neighbor and her daughter join us for the festivities and had a really nice time.  I am thankful that we had a delicious meal that resembled American food and nice time with friends as well as the many blessings in our lives right now..India, fun kids, health, friends, many things to be thankful for.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Short and Sweet

There is a really pretty lake close to our apartment and we went for a walk around it this weekend.  There are some flowers there called "touch-me-not" that are fun to touch because the leaves close when you touch them.  The kids had a great time running around the lake touching every one they saw.  The plants were easy to spot because they had small pink flowers that look similar to a little pom pom.  Here are a few pictures from the last weekend.  Enjoy!
P.S. Check back tomorrow or Friday and I will post some pictures of our Thanksgiving food here.  We are having a small "feast" with our family, but it is really hard to find US items and I think you will enjoy what you see...

Ben and me!

Samantha and Joshua playing on the playground at our apartment.

Luke participating in a socially acceptable activity for men

Zoe and Joshua being cute with flowers in their hair

touch-me-not, the leaves are the ones that look similar to a fern

A Fun Weekend

We were invited to our first Indian Dinner with a friend this weekend.  They had a dinner party to introduce us to some other people in the apartment complex and have a fun evening together.  We asked what time to arrive and were told that they eat early, around 7:30 pm, so we could arrive any time around then.  Our kids usually go to bed at 7pm, so we were pretty sure that it would be an interesting evening.  We were not disappointed to discover that they were horribly behaved and embarrassed us quite a bit throughout the evening.  However, our friends all laughed and said "kids will be kids," thank goodness. I think universally kids can't help but ask for desert after any meal, but it is still embarrassing when you are out in public and they loudly ask for whatever it is that they desire. (Especially in India where you have to be very careful what you say, any thought that you might need or want something will send someone running off to get it for you-their duty as a good host) The good news is that we learned some really important lessons to teach our kids:
1. Don't ask for desert
2. Don't ask if there is going to be desert
3. Don't ask what is for desert
4. Do say thank you for the delicious food, even if you don't like it
5. Do not say I don't like this food
6. Don't say "WHAT IS THAT!?!" 
7. Do not say I'm bored
8. Play with the other children
9. Mommy and Daddy don't count as "other children"
10. If mommy and Daddy say no desert, it means NO DESERT. -Don't ask the Indians.  They will give it to you.  And we don't want that.  Dang it, this is a hard lesson to teach.
It's funny how these used to be common knowledge in our home.
The food was excellent, and we met some really nice people. We took our kids home around 11pm and saw a 2 year old playing on the playground with her parents on the way home. 
I'm not sure how the kids here function, it seems as if Indian kids are either walking zombies or running on delirium.  Maybe they just don't need as much sleep, but going to bed at 11pm or midnight is normal (most families don't eat until 9 or 10) and then they wake up at 6am or earlier for school.  Yikes!  Maybe I need less sleep than I think, or maybe the whole country needs more.  I am beginning to wonder if genetics has anything to do with it.  Maybe in India the people who needed the least amount of sleep were the most desirable mates and it was bred into them as a people.  All I know is that it is 10:50pm, which is WAY past my bedtime.  I need to go to sleep, I think I am becoming delirious...

'ello mates!

A few days ago I was walking down the road with Zoe and I couldn't help feeling a little lost.  The street was busy with people, smog so thick it was like a fog on the city, and horns were honking in their Indian sing song type voices. Suddenly she reached her sweet little arms around my neck and hugged me and I was reminded that even in the midst of life a half a world away from the only home we have known there is a home that we bring with us.  Each other.
Some things are exactly the same no matter where you are.  Zoe still gets excited over the moon.  Joshua still wants to be snuggled for a few extra minutes right when he wakes up and asks for snuggles for "one more minute" before he goes to sleep no matter how long he has been cuddled.  Luke still wants to play video games. Samantha still likes to hold my hand and I still like to give Ben a hug right when he walks in the door from work.  I still want to find time to draw and paint. I want to become a better person than I was when i got here.  The things that make us who we are are don't leave us just because we leave one place for another.
Today I am not homesick.  I feel lost and yet also peaceful.
So many crazy things are happening in our lives right now and yet there is something that brings peace to my soul.  I was listening to a song by Reliant K the other day (Never Underestimate My Jesus) and thinking about how sometimes when the world doesn't make sense, it's OK. The world doesn't have to make sense for me to find and have peace.
In other ramblings, I am having a crazy hard time here trying to figure out why no one understands my accent.  Don't they know that I DO NOT have an accent?  THEY do! A friend here took me grocery shopping and I was SHOCKED to find that she spoke to all the grocery store helpers in ENGLISH!!!! I have been speaking English to them for weeks and they have never once understood me!  It is time for me to break out my British accent.  I am not kidding.  The other day I asked for a pressure cooker for 5 minutes.  Finally, I hung my head and pretended I was British.  Immediately I was understood and taken directly to the item in question.  sigh...
If only I had discovered this sooner, I may have had a much easier time here.  :)
By the way, I need to make a correction to an earlier post.  When I said that corny is "brilliant" here, what I meant was that "brilliant" here means "wonderful, great idea, or amazing!"  However, anything that I would consider corny in America (examples are kissing your own biceps and winking in music videos)  are considered "cool" here. I love it!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Happy Monday~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One crazy day

     The days have been very busy lately, full of stories that I will slowly put into words, but today put the icing on the cake.  You know the type of day I am talking about, the kind you can laugh about today because events suddenly become so ridiculous that you can't help but laugh.
    Someone was supposed to come at 9:30 to help with chores and the kids.  I am really feeling the need for this type of help as I have begun to home school. Although I love homeschooling, I need to devote some full time attention to our older kids and the little ones are more than happy to run amok, making messes, playing in the toilet, spraying each other with "the nozzle" and generally taking markers (where do they find them??) to themselves and other things. Perhaps some of you are wondering what the nozzle is.  The nozzle is my nickname for the sprayer next to the toilet here.  You don't use toilet paper to wipe, you use the nozzle to wash off. This has taken some time to get use to, but the cost and quality of toilet paper here is enough to make us want to save a few trees.  Don't worry about wasting water from the nozzle, they re-route our sewage here back into the lakes and inevitably our drinking water.  We are all about recycling here.  Ahhh well, back to today...
     At 10 o clock my neighbor, who is helping me find a helper, called to let me know that she will bring our helper by in about 15-20 minutes.  15 minutes later our doorbell rang and when I answered it one of the maids from downstairs was there wanting to make sure it was OK for her to take some boxes I had left outside our door for her. (As we were unpacking she asked for our extra boxes and mentioned we could leave them outside our door.) I stepped outside to say yes and Luke, Samantha, and Joshua all came running out with me.  Zoe, still in the apartment, then promptly closed the door behind us.  In our apartment building the doors automatically lock behind you.  All week long I have been disciplining Zoe for opening the door.  "Zoe do not open the door"  "Zoe you do not open the door without mommy" "Zoe, do NOT TOUCH THE DOOR"
sigh...
     Today Zoe stood inside the locked apartment screaming loudly and refusing to open the door.  Why is it that they only learn the lesson at the exact moment that it would be really convenient for them to disobey?
So I stood on the other side of the door saying in my sweetest voice
"it's okay Zoe, don't worry, just open the door"
"Zoe, just push the latch"
"Zoe, mommy is right on the other side of the door, just open it up and let me in"
"Zoe, it's ok, just open the door so mommy can give you kisses"
Honestly, I am not sure Zoe could hear me over her own screams, plus the frantic maid next to me, trying to coax her in Kannada to open the door.  Then 2 of my neighbors opened their doors and came into the hallway to see what the ruckus was
"yes, the baby is locked in the house" "the keys are in the house with the baby" "the baby closed the door while we were in the hallway" I can't call my husband, my cell phone is locked in the house too and I don't have his # memorized yet"
Then the elevator door opened and my neighbor bringing the new helper arrived.  "hello, my name is Melissa, these are 3 of my children and the screaming coming from inside the apartment is the baby who locked us out" "yes, the keys are inside" "yes, my husband is at work and I can't call him because my cell phone with his # in it is locked inside"
Lots of pandemonium, all the neighbors are now pressing against the door trying in about 4 different languages to coax Zoe to open the door.
    After about 10 minutes of this, one neighbor tells us that our patio is adjoining hers and someone can just step over the wall to get in and asks if my doors are open on the patio.  They are, so she has 2 men from her house step over the wall, come downstairs and open the door.  Zoe is hiding, terrified behind the door and clings to me like a monkey for about 10 minutes after I pick her up.  The neighbor then notifies me that I should not leave my doors and windows open and I can't help but wonder if it is because she wants me to be safe (the only way to get into our apartment would be to go through hers) or if she thinks we are too loud.  It is a definite possibility.
I know that I caused severe anxiety to not only my neighbors, my new helper (who took the job obviously thinking I needed the help) and my friend, but especially to the maid who patted her heart while repeating something over and over in Kannada every time she saw me for the rest of the day.
Oh well, I have learned 2 importnant lessons from this
1. Keep my keys on my person at all times.  ALL TIMES.
2. I need to memorize Ben's cell phone #.

Socially acceptable activities for Men

In India there are a few activities that are completely acceptable for men that we would probably not see much of in the states.  I am not saying you wouldn't see it, just probably not as often as you would see it here.
Here are a few:
1. wearing pink
2. driving a pink scooter or motorcycle
3. taking pictures of each other striking poses near trees
-this was one of my favorites.  We came upon a group of 5 men in their late 20's.  One was lounging casually against a tree and the other 4 were all snapping pictures with their phones.  In the states if you had come upon this group they all would have had embarrassed smiles while pretending to do something else.  Here a few smiled and waved and went back to business while some were too engrossed in what they were doing to pay any attention to us.
4. walking down the street holding hands or pinky fingers with your best friend (who is also male)
5. stare at whatever you want.  This really applies to the women as well, we just see way more men doing it.  See Ben's blog at www.population6.blogspot.com if you want to see us getting stared at.
6. Grab some white lady's baby (even if the baby is screaming and doesn't want to be a part of it) and take your picture with said screaming baby 

Now, I say these things in good fun with a smile on my face, but I hope you know that I really enjoy these things as part of Indian culture.  All week long I have been getting stared and giggled at, and I know my ways are equally puzzling and cause for giggles as mine are to them.  The truth is, I have no idea what I am doing that is so funny, but everyone around me is definately in on some kind of inside joke that I am not understanding.
For example, today I was walking home from getting groceries when I noticed that I was being video taped by a group of girls who were cracking up on a bus just in front of me.  I have NO idea what was so hysterical, but I am certain there is a you-tube video somewhere of me walking through the parking lot with Samantha and Zoe.   I know what you are thinking, I probably had a huge hole in my shirt or something on my face.  I didn't, trust me-I checked when I got home.  However, I did have Zoe in the Ergo (kind of like a backpack for putting your kids in.)  I know this is unusual here because I never see other people wearing them and whenever I wear mine I get lots of extra stares and smiles. 
So hopefully you will read my musings knowing that I have very high regard for Indian Culture.  There is so much I love here!  However, there are some things that are so different that I have to comment for those who can't see for themselves.
Happy November!