Eating Nacho Chips with a Spoon

Hi there,

Just wanted to give you an update from India since Karen is gone to America. I thought I would explain some of the social events that happen around here. Ignore the first picture for now, we will get back to that in a minute. The second photo just shows a group of folks
that are called the Gurgaon Connection. On Wednesday mornings they meet at the local Crowne Plaza Hotel for coffee and pastries. I don't get to go too often because I am out of town

but for the last two weeks I have been able to attend. It was here that we met our friends Gene and Kim Copeland. Gene was brave enough to come to these meetings, too, even though he and I and Bill are the only men who show up for this. The rest are wives of men who are in India working full-time jobs or are here with their own business and they have enough flexibility in their schedules to occasionally come to this.

That's Bill on the left of photo 3. His wife is an attorney who is here helping develop their clientele in India. The last photo is Kim, and Gene with me at the coffee. I hadn't taken my camera out with me for awhile so I brought it today and took a couple of photos of the group.

It's one of the meetings around here that is mainly for people from other places for whom India isn't home and to share feelings and thoughts about living here. Gene is a training pilot under contract with Air India on their CRJ commuter jets. Kim came to India once and then went back to Texas. Gene has been here for 2 and 1/2 years and now he got Kim back and I believe she is going to stay this time. She is really good friends with my Karen. After our social gathering this morning Gene and Kim were kind enough to give me a ride home so I suggested that we go out to eat lunch on the way. Gene suggested this new restaurant out by our place that we thought was a new Mexican food place because the name was Picante's. It also has a picture of a huge chili pepper on it's sign. In America this would definitely be a Mexican restaurant. So, while Gene and Kim were up front I went on back and looked for a table. As soon as we walked in, which was more outside than in, but with a covered area with ceiling fans, we sat down and got the menu. Now, here we were captive at this place and pretty much committed to eating here and now the menu doesn't have one, single Mexican item on it. It's an Indian food place with a chili pepper picture and Picante as a name because they put pepper pretty much in everything they cook. Oh, and if you look at that menu from the restaurant in the picture up above, you will see an interesting picture of a woman smoking from a "hookah" and apparently they have Picante flavored hookah if you want at this place. Now tell me the closest restaurant to where you live that offers Picante flavored hookah right on the menu!! See, we're not in Kansas anymore, Toto. I just had to take a picture of it and send along for the blog page this week. We ordered some "chili potatoes" and some chicken with "low spice". Actually, while we had fear, the food was pretty good and we came out okay on our risky deal.

Now for the closer on today's stories, I have to tell you why I am now eating Nacho chips with a spoon. When I was in California with my son and was going to be flying immediately back to Delhi, I asked him to take me somewhere where I could buy some huge bags of nacho chips. He knew exactly where to take me to get some "Mission tortilla strips". They are great chips and I purchased two huge bags to put in the special suitcase I had borrrowed from Brad and Jess just to bring food that I like back to India. I had canned foods and flushable baby wipes and batteries and all sorts of things in there, along with my books from my refresher flight course. Well, I found out that the TSA, our new government Security forces were not at all happy with the two huge bags of tortilla chips since this is possibly a way to smuggle drugs. So, they left a nice note in the suitcase that explained that due to new rules they had to go through the tortilla chip bags. The clear plastic windows on the sides of the bags were both pierced (I hope they were wearing clean gloves) and of course, it wouldn't do to just put your finger in the bag, no, you have to check all around in case someone is smuggling something in those chips, so, when I arrived in Delhi, the cans of food were quite bent and the chips looked more like powder than chips. I am not to be deterred and, so, while in America I would have thrown them away, I have determined not to let TSA beat me at my own game, so now I have to eat my chips with a spoon because there is really no other convenient way to eat chips that are ground pretty much to powder. Amazingly, the taste is still great and in the dry climate here in Delhi they are staying relatively fresh for having been a month and a half since I bought them. See what you can do when you put your mind to it. The main reason I had bought them was to enjoy with Karen's homemade "Poor Man's Caviar" dip recipe that we got from Jennifer in Pittsburgh. It is an awesome recipe and we picked out the largest pieces as carriers for the dip. It worked and now the rest of the chips are way too small to do anything with but dip with a spoon and enjoy the taste, if not the texture. Remember my father said one of the ways to survive in a foreign country was to remain "adaptable?" Well, here's a good example of adapability.

Tomorrow I have to fly for the first time in about 5 days. Just to make it interesting, the aviation authorities in India have decided since the Air India crash that they should occasionally ride along with everyone and make sure that they are using safe procedures. Fortunately for me, my pilot buddy Gene has been on a couple of checks with this very inspector so he told me what to expect and the kinds of questions that he will ask. Very helpful and it should be an easy day if the visibility cooperates. The airport we are flying into is a Visual airport only so we will be required to have 5 kilometers of visibility (about 3 and 1/2 miles). This will be reported by the tower guy at the destination airport, who is the local flight instructor at the flight school walking around with a low powered walkie-talkie to be the "controller" at our destination. The runway is only 4000 feet long and it will be hot so we will keep the fuel way down since the airport is only 25 minutes from Delhi. It's just a drop off of passengers and head right back to Delhi, so should be an easy day.

Karen called and the wedding proceeded according to schedule in Las Vegas so she is enjoying a few family days and then heading back to our place near Pittsburgh to finish cleaning up some of the messes we left behind and to put some stuff in storage.

I hope you all are doing well and enjoying your summer.

Dan

Any Sunday in the summer

Hi friends,

Well, this time of year for many, many years our family would head out on Sunday for our favorite little paradise, Lake Ocoee, in East Tennessee. Since I am currently in India with no opportunity to ski I have to just take a trip down memory lane. When I first moved to Cleveland, Tennessee in March of 1980, one of the first people I was introduced to was Doug Jones, who flew a King Air for his father and their company owned the hangar next to ours in Cleveland. Luckily for me, as a ski enthusiast for all of my life, Doug was also a skiier and since we were also both pilots, we spent a tremendous amount of time together at the lake. Doug was single, but I had a very understanding and often participating wife on our trips to the lake. Many is the night we slept in tents or friends cabins and would ski until darkness shut down our program and often we were the first ones on the lake in the morning. Doug had his own Ski Supreme and we skied with that for many years. When he moved to Atanta, I had to buy my own boat and this was the second boat we owned from 1991 until 2006. I sold this boat to friend Mickey Turner and he has completely gone through and restored it beautifully. I would love to see it. Before that, we had a black one just like this from 1986 to 1989. Doug has married and moved to near Loma Linda, CA, where Brad is now and he still skies with my son out there whenever they get a chance. In fact, just over a year ago, we all went out together and did a little skiing just before I left for India. As you can see from the water, this was a great place for skiing, if you timed it right. So many of our friends had cabins and boatslips at the marina. We chose to keep our boat in the garage and trailer it to the lake so that it stayed clean and because our boats often had idiosyncracies that meant they really shouldn't be kept in the water while we were away. My son Brad and I often joke about all the things you had to know in order to drive our boat all day without some big issues, but we always had a good time, even when we had to be rescued or had to paddle for 30 minutes to get back where we could get the boat out.

The way I saw it, if we had the boat, no matter how much trouble it was, the party was under our control, and that was a huge thing with two kids growing up in our house. The second picture is one of Brad and his best buddies at the lake just a few years ago. Now all those guys are married with their own children and are well on the way to their careers as professionals. Matt, on the left, is an orthopedic surgeon in Chattanooga, Nick is a nurse anesthetist in Naples, Florida, Scott is in the long term health care business in Cleveland, TN and Brad (my son) is an MBA working in Southern CA while his wife finishes her pediatric residency. I flew for Scott's grandfather for many years when we first moved to Tennessee. All of these guys are like my own kids and we often had skiing and wakeboarding outings when schedules and weather cooperated. Growing up together, wakeboarding together, going to the same schools, going to the lake, these are all great memories of these kids.

And, the first picture is one of my daughter Shayna and our little Bichon Friese, Lacey, her best friend growing up. Lacey loved the lake, as well, and would beg to get in and swim a few strokes when it was hot, but always came out in a hurry, as it was cool with her thin fur. I am currently in India to save up for my cabin on the lake for my retirement. I am always happiest when the water is lapping at the side of my boat and not far from where I sleep. Ideally, I would have a place on the lake that would be located on an airstrip. There is a place I am thinking about down in Milledgeville, Georgia. Too bad these people are so proud of these places, but maybe something will work out. You have to have dreams, right? Karen likes the Asheville/Hendersonville, NC area so I will maybe go looking for water there. Don't have your real-estate agent call me, I still hope to be working here for several more years. If I had all the money I spent on boat and car gas to get to the lake, I could have already retired, but then I wouldn't have these priceless memories, so this is a good tradeoff. Plus, now if I need an orthopedic doc, an anesthetist or a nursing home, I know some people!!

Hey, this had nothing to do with India and that was exactly the purpose for just a few minutes.

The rope is tight so "Hit it."

Dan

Big Boss at His own airport

That's Mr. Jindal in the brown shirt in the middle of this crowd as we arrived at the airport in Raigahr, India, where he owns the steel mill and the airport and lots of the town. As you can see from the photo, when he comes to town, he garners lots of attention. If you study the body language and position you notice that India has a way of showing true respect for the boss. The ex-pat that is the farthest away and facing back towards the camera in a white shirt is my friend from last summer at the guest house, named Jasper Marais, and he is from South Africa and is in charge of the construction of the coal-gasification power plant that is being built. Many of the other white shirts in this photo are either fixed-wing pilots or helicopter pilots. As we arrived, Mr. Jindal briefly instructed what was happening that day and then climbed into the waiting helicopter to take him onsite to another project that he is working on. I snapped this photo shortly after he climbed off the jet I was flying and before he got into the helicopter. I thought it was just an interesting snapshot of a day in the life of one of India's true industrialist's fueling the growth and positioning himself to benefit from the tremendous expansion of India's economy.

During this week I have had in the back of my mind that while I was looking at the Himilayas out the window of my jet from 41,000 feet and thinking that this is the time of year for Mt. Everest climbs, I wondered what kind of year it was. On May 24th, 2004, a personal friend of mine from Chattanooga, TN, Scott Graham, an attorney and pilot for a development and construction company, took a few months out and at age 44, climbed Mt. Everest successfully that year. I really enjoyed my time flying with and talking to Scott, and so became more than casually interested in the stories from that mountain. Sadly, I see from the news this year that a great, young man from Scotland, 28 years old, fulfilled his lifelong dream to climb Everest this year and then died while descending the mountain on May 26 of this year. It gives me a strange feeling to know that I was looking out my window at that very area on that very day and this man was there. I looked up some of the statistics about Everest and I saw that a 69 year old man tried and died climbing the mountain recently. I will content myself to look out the window and see it. I hope to travel to Katmandu while living here and even go up to Base camp just to see it. Scott, my friend from Chattanooga, is well on his way to climbing all of the tallest peaks on the 7 continents in his lifetime. When I last visited with him he had done South America, Africa, Everest and was in pursuit of the others. Nice legacy, expensive hobby, interesting life. Interestingly, Scott lives on Lookout Mountain, TN, USA and his friends and neighbors own the Rock City tourist attraction that has advertising signs all over the country. They offered Scott 10,000 USD to carry a silk flag to the top of Everest and unfurl it for a picture at the top of the world (See Rock City). He took and successfully completed that challenge. I was impressed, after all, do you know anyone who has climbed Everest? 29,029 feet above sea level, I cannot believe when I am flying at FL290 that I am even with the top of the mountain. Just to keep Scott's head screwed on straight, he has a lady who climbs every mountain that he does and they complete these climbs at the same time. So, it's not a power thing, it's an adjustment to high altitude and lack of oxygen and acclimatizing your body to such conditions, plus having luck with weather and conditions at the top of the mountain. I still remember Scott saying that his brain felt like mush for almost 6 months after he came down off the mountain. It really does affect you.

Karen is traveling to the USA as I write this. She left the apartment this morning at 2 a.m. in order to be on time and processed for her flight which left Delhi around 5 a.m. Three hours seems like a lot of time but when you are going international, time just flies while you are going through customs, processing your boarding and being scanned for the 3rd time. At least this time she will enjoy the benefits of business class. I can't wait to talk with her when she gets to America. I know it's a horribly long trip. She will be nearly 15 hours in flight from Abu Dhabi to Chicago and has 3 hour layovers in Abu Dhabi and Chicago. Sometimes, with international travel those 3 hour layovers can evaporate in a hurry if there is some kind of delay. She has been in the air for hours and it will be 10 more before she lands.

My brother had his birthday yesterday, my son has his birthday and anniversary in the next week and some friends here have their birthdays soon. My friend Ulyana, from Ukraine, has her baby due this week so I hope it's born on Brad's bday, on the 8th. We had a big thunderstorm blow by here about 30 minutes ago so summer and monsoon season might be a little bit early this year. Last year I arrived simultaneously with the monsoons on June 29th. They were late and weak last year, hopefully, they will get plenty of rain this year.

We had an unexpected visitor at the apartment yesterday in the form of a small lizard. It fell to the floor and our smallest kittie cat promptly ate it. Karen and I were both shocked, as the other cats pretty much ignored this little guy. Poppy wasted no time in making an extra meal out of this one. We know Jupy, our white cat from Pennsylvania, would have done the same thing. He wasted no time in trying to get any bug or rodent that dared to intrude in his territory. Poppy still is very small and probably doesn't weigh a pound yet, so it was kind of surprising.

Hope you are all doing well. Thanks for your notes and letters. Karen returns on July 15th, so I will be counting the days. She actually told me that coming back to India to see me and the kitties would be the favorite part of her trip to America and back. I asked her yesterday and was pleased with the reply, since she seems to be adjusting so well.

My contract is renewed and we have our visas extended for now. I am working on the paper work for extending my India pilot's licenses and adding the new plane. That should be done within a month and my license from last year is good until July 15 so we have a little time.

Take care,

Dan

Wichita Training and White Coat ceremony

Surprise!! I had no idea I was going to be flying two airplanes again in India. The DGCA voted to allow ex-pat pilots to fly more than one type of aircraft again. Some of you will remember that I was flying both when I first came over here but then, in October, they took that privelege away. Now, after companies were begging them to relax the rule, I was asked again to fly both but this required a longer stay in America as I scrambled to schedule and get to a Sim training center with a CJ2 or CJ3 Sim. Our particular aircraft that we have in India is a CJ2 but the Sim can be used for both aircraft with a differences class that is taught onsite.

This was actually very good news to me as I had wished to visit my daughter in Portland, Oregon, to see her white coat ceremony at Pacific University. It was a great program and I was just so proud of her and her intelligence, good looks and the amount of discipline that it takes to get through any kind of medical program. I remember graduate school and the tests, book reports, quizzes, reading, learning, TESTS, and it is definitely a program for young people, although Shayna has a man in his 70's in her class.

This visit I got to spend time with Brad, Jess and Sadie in Loma Linda for several days. I also got to spend some quality time with Judy Winters, Jess's mother. She is such a delightful lady and I certainly enjoyed getting to know her a little better as we both shared the experience of being new grandparents. She is retired from teaching nursing at Southern Adventist University and was a highly loved and recognized teacher there. What a nice surprise it was to have a little bit of overlap time with the new parents and the genious and gorgeous (and quickly growing) granddaughter. Grandpa was super happy after he got her to laugh. FUN can be so simple!!

With the parents both working and going to medical school and taking care of a new baby (when does sleep occur??), Judy took me to the nearby Ontario airport for my trip up to see Shayna, Keith and Portland, where my cousin Dixie picked me up at the airport. Dixie asked me if I wanted to drive and when I deferred, she called me a wussy!! I had been driving around Los Angeles for several days and I actually enjoy being driven around Delhi, so it was nice to have her do the driving and to pick me up at the airport, which is about 45 minutes from where my kids live in Hillsboro. From there, it was straight to Shayna's program and I so enjoyed visiting with the many proud parents and grandparents who had come from all over America to see their kid's proud moment of accomplishment. My cousin Dixie spent many of her growing up years in North Dakota and my mother comes from South Dakota. At the white coat program it seemed like most of the people sitting around us were from the Dakotas and Iowa. Such nice people and everyone was so kind. I took the kids out to Shayna's favorite, Olive Garden, for a celebration dinner. Shayna, Keith and I did manage to get to a miniature golf course and a bowling alley. I could not believe how rusty my skills were. I was leading the golf game, much to Keith's disgust, when I had a blow-out hole with a score of 6 that put me one stroke behind with not much golf left to play. My bowling score was in the two digit range so strikes and spares were rare. We all had a blast, though, and I think Keith will proudly frame the golf score card and hang it on the wall as one of his proudest moments in sport, and that's fine with me!! Fun day for sure. Shayna displayed her continuing talent in the bowling alley as she blew us out. Great fun. One of the pics above shows, Keith, Shayna, Dixie and me on the lawn at Pacific U for the ceremony.

From Portland, it was on to Wichita, which had called and fit me into a last minute class for the CJ3 so I headed for training there. I hadn't been to training in Wichita since I last did my Citation Excell Initial class there exactly 10 years ago. Everything is so convenient there and the mid-west hospitality is so refreshing. I was amazed by the uncrowded highways and the amount of open space, as well as the very cool (for me) temperatures, which were ranging in the 60'sF and low 70'sF. It was a wonderful little respite. Just drinking the water from the faucets and fountains was such a treat.

Well, I am back and have already done a flight. Yesterday we were at Barmer, in Western India near the Pakistan border. The temp when we got ready to depart at 4 in the afternoon was 52C, which is somewhere around 126F. This is by far the hottest departure I have ever had. Both windshield overheat lights were on as the ambient temps had pushed the windshields past their 145F temp limit. A couple of circuit breakers required resetting because they had popped due to the ambient temp in the cockpit. Our fuel temperature, which is measured inside the tanks was 47C, so that is some hot fuel. Thanks to Uncle Clyde (Clyde Cessna was the founder of Cessna Aircraft back in the day), we had no issues and were so thankful for the APU to help us precool the cabin and make a pretty normal departure. Operating limits for the Citation are 54C so we were within two degrees of the maximum. Cessna probably had to go to Death Valley, California in the summer time, where the airport is named Furnace Creek, to find those temps, we were oh so close. Wow! A long ways from Wichita, that's for sure. We were also flying from a military airport where there are bunkers with Mig's of all sorts underground to go against anything developing to the West. Can't take pictures of this, but would love to send Cessna a picture of their beautiful airplane parked on a Fighter Jet base in Western India with ambient temps running near record limits. I am amazed at the adventure that is my everyday life.

Please pray for my friends Don and Peggy Williams in Paradise, CA. Their beautiful, young daughter with two kids, aged 3 and 5, was killed in a tragic auto accident a couple of weeks ago. Words cannot express my sorrow and I cannot imagine having to bury your young daughter while her kids and young husband and parents are left to deal. I love you guys and pray for you every single day. They are on my email list and so receive my letters everytime. Some day we will be in a better place, that's for sure.

Until next time,

Dan

Recurrent training

Hello friends,
Well, here I am back in Dallas for recurrent training. My annual training wasn't due until June but the company wanted to take advantage of my copilot getting married and since they gave him 10 days off in early May, they wanted me to go and get the recurrent over with so we could get back to flying as soon as possible.
I took advantage of this trip and again flew into Los Angeles so I could visit with my son and daughter-in-law and, of course, baby Sadie. After a short visit, I went to big D and did the training and then immediately flew back to LA. I was certain I was going to miss seeing my daughter Shayna this time because she was gone with her husband Keith on a cruise for the week.
While in Southern CA I went back to my old church in Garden Grove, where I used to pastor, and paid a visit. I was happy to see that my old friend Dan Smith from Andrews University days, was there and rebuilding the church program in a big way with lots of excitement. It was strange to see my old office and first church job after finishing my theology training at La Sierra in 1976. A couple of years have slipped by. But I saw old friend Steve Zeller from La Sierra days and we had a great catch up conversation. I remember Steve because he had the first Honda car I had ever seen. It was about 1974 0r 5 and this car had a two cylinder motorcycle engine under the hood. They have come a long ways, that's for sure.
I had received an email from my company back in India that they wanted me to extend my stay and also go back to Citation CJ2 recurrency. This would be with FlightSafety in Orlando or Wichita, so I started working on that and now it ended up that I got to fly up to Portland, see my daughter's white coat ceremony in Optometry from Pacific University in Portland before heading out to Wichita, Kansas for the CJ recurrent. The timing was just perfect and I was so happy to be able to do all this.
I called one of my pilot buddies back in India to find out why I am suddenly able to fly 2 airplanes again and I guess the Indian DGCA has changed their rules again and I can now fly 2 separate airplanes for two separate companies again after the 1st of June. So, it's 2 refreshers this time and then from Wichita down to Houston, where I can reconnect with my Emirates flight back to Delhi via Dubai. I can't wait for that wonderful business class travel segment again, that will really spoil you for good.
Shayna had asked me about attending her white coat ceremony when I came to America but I didn't get a positive response from my company about it so I had told her it was off. The whole thing about adding the CJ refresher training was what opened the schedule up because they couldn't fit me in until Thursday so I had three free days to go up to Portland and that's exactly when her program was. I am still amazed and so pleased that it worked out.
I haven't done any training in Wichita since April of 2000 when I first got certified in Citation Excells. I used to go there quite frequently for my training but have been using another company or another location for a long time. It will be interesting to go back and see what has changed.
You can see from my picture on this post what the Simulator looks like from the inside. Just exactly like the airplane. On the outside it looks like something from outer space. But, it keeps us flying safe and that's what its all about.
Karen is all alone in India for these two weeks but is doing great and has her cats to keep her occupied. She will be coming to America in June for a family wedding and to try and take care of more of our Pennsylvania stuff. She should be back over in a month or two. She won't miss much in the HOT Delhi summer. Many folks are gone during that time of year, kind of like Phoenix, where I used to live.
Take care,

Dan

Visit to the Taj Mahal

Hi friends,

Well, I can no longer say that I have not been to the Taj Mahal. It' s quite a road trip from where we live but we buckled in and, despite queasy tummies, we headed out for our big adventure.

Our driver got me a little bit upset because he only knew the way by going back up to Delhi and starting from there so I think we wasted at least 1 and 1/2 to 2 hours on the road. When you are riding on very rough roads and trying not to either throw up or have a case of diarhhea, then you really don't need to add extra miles to the program. But we eventually reached (as they say here) and checked into our very nice hotel while waiting for the sun angles to get low for the sunset shots of the Taj. After a short break, we headed on over and began our tour. Our tour guide, Del, was just a hoot and we enjoyed him thoroughly because of his sensitivity and his sense of humor. One of his great statements about driving on Indian roads was "Good horn, good brakes, and good luck." That really is a great description of the Indian driving adventure. Another statement that he made that has really stuck with me through the weeks here is, when referring to the sales persons who accosted the tourists as you approach the Taj, "I can give you good advice, but I cannot control your hands." I thought that often that is probably how God feels about us when He sees our lives and choices.

As we were touring the Taj that evening, the girls were in recovery from "Delhi belly" and Dan was holding out but weakley and finally acceded to the constraints of his tummy. I had thought, at one point, that I was going to throw up on the Queens tomb, but miraculously made it out and only later on the grass did the ladies learn how I really felt during most of the tour. That night we all rested really well and everyone woke up feeling better the next morning. My Taj pictures by the morning light are the favorite photos that I have ever taken and partly because of the subject matter, but also because they came out so well.

Since Karen's mom and Aunt Verda came and went, we have also enjoyed a visit from Lynne, Karen's sister. We took her to Old Delhi and just had a blast around town and seeing all the sights. Lynne was so positive and fun to be with, we really enjoyed the visit and taking her out to see the rare sights of Delhi here.

If things go as planned, I will be packing my suitcase and getting ready to go to America again in order to accomodate my boss's request to go and get my recurrent training done so that we don't have the Citation grounded for too long, since my copilot is getting married the 5th of May. He will be off work from the 1st through the 10th and I am trying to make my break coincide with his time off. It puts a lot of pressure on me to get to America, get trained, visit family and friends a little bit and then get back to work in Delhi by the 10th of May. I am looking forward to getting it all done and to being steadily back at work again soon. Living here is just such a fascinating place to be. The sights and sounds and views out the window are just something that you would see in National Geographic but not out of your home or car window. India is such a mix of old and new, rich and poor, modern and ancient and always interesting.

I hadn't put up a blog for awhile so I wanted to do one quickly since I am possibly going to be gone for a couple of weeks and then back flying again. Since our desktop computer seems to not to want to communicate on Skype, I am leaving my computer so Karen can talk to her family and then, when I get back, I will see about getting it fixed. I will try to access through my son's computer while in America and with my American cell phone.

I have lots to tell you next time I get a chance to sit down and write. Right now I just need a safe trip to America and back and another successful visit to Dallas to get my recurrent flight training done.

Talk soon,

Dan

Family visits us in New Delhi

Last Sunday evening Karen's mom and aunt came to New Delhi to visit us. We are having fun and are excited to have some company over here to do some traveling around with.
Karen likes to dress up and get into costumes, etc. so we got into our Indian clothes that we have purchased to wear to my co-pilot's Indian wedding which is coming up in the middle of May.
They would have never recognized us so I went up to them as they came out of the airport and then I took them over to see Karen. You can see pictures of what we looked like when I post our most recent photo album here in a day or two. We have been doing something just about every other day and then, in between, trying to get rested up and ready for the next, big outing. No one can appreciate the amount of energy and time that it takes to do anything unless you have been over here and experienced what it's like. A two hour errand back home where you could hit several of your desired stores, etc. can take more than one day and by the time you deal with Delhi traffic you are exhausted.
Last night (Thursday) we walked to the Italian restaurant at the mall that is nearby. It was a pretty good dinner and as we walked home in the dark we were walking along the dusty road that crosses a field right before you get to our apartments. It was dark and we were walking and talking when all of a sudden a tiny little kitten came walking right up the road towards us. We were shocked because there just aren't any cats in Delhi or Gurgaon hardly and here was this tiny little cat walking all alone. He wouldn't have lived for an hour as there are many Delhi dogs around and if not for one of them, there are cars and cows and people who don't like cats. This kitten cannot be more than two or three weeks old. It's eyes are open but it is so small. Of course Karen and I picked it up and it had to come live with us or it would die. Today we talked to the manager of our complex and he thought there was a mother somewhere but when I went and talked to an Indian woman who had been giving the kitten milk, she said there was no mother. So, now we have 3 cats, one adult, one teenager cat (probably 4 months old) and now our newest addition, who is so tiny you can't imagine that this little kitty could have survived the night if she hadn't run into us. The cat is so fortunate that even though it is a female I have nicknamed it Lucky. We are having to heat milk slightly in the microwave and put some kitten chow in the milk and hope that it drinks enough and maybe chews a bite now and then to get enough nutrition to survive. It seems to be doing okay for now and I have given the new cat residence in the jacuzzi tub in our master bathroom since it really kind of needs protection from the other cats until it gets just a little bit bigger.
Today we went to Old Delhi. This part of town is as different from where we live as night is from day. It was a one hour taxi ride away but it's a totally different world. The streets are very narrow, the electricity runs through very scary looking wires and the noise level is deafening. We did some shopping at the spice markets, the saree market and the jewerly stores. Everyone came away feeling very good about their purchases and the prices. Moreover, we all had fun and it is so interesting that it's hard to process all the amazing sights that your eyes take in.
One of the highlights of the day for me was a whole row of dentists that were lined up along the sidewalk who offered to sell you dentures. They showed a small picture of your smiling mouth and so I went over with my camera and asked how much. I have no idea what dentures cost in America but you could get a full set of lowers for 2000 Indian Rupees ($42) and uppers for the same price, so you could get a complete set of dentures for less than $85. When I tried to take a photograph they seemed less than excited about the prospect. Maybe they thought I was from the government and they were operating illegally, I don't know. You can also see photos of this operation when I post my latest photos. Having been trained to pull teeth while I was in Africa about 30 years ago, I have always been interested in dentistry in the third world countries.
This weekend I will be singing in the choir for the Easter service at the Sunday church. I have been warming up my trumpet and getting ready to play at church here in a few weeks. Now that I have digital sound tracks recorded on my computer, accompaniment is a much easier chore. I wish I were in Tennessee this weekend so I could enjoy the Easter Sunrise Service at Southern Adventist University. It is always well done and something that I really enjoy every year.
Miss you people and hope to have some of you as visitors here before we come home. We are just enjoying this adventure so much. Karen and I just look around in amazement at what our eyes take in every day. It's not for the faint of heart.
The picture is of Me, Aunt Verda, Karen and Karen's mom Anne on top of the spice market today. Many more pictures to follow with details that are hard to describe.