Welcome Back Picnic & More Ganeshas

The school threw a welcome back bash for all the students' families yesterday complete with American favorites like hamburgers, hot dogs, cotton candy, Mickey Mouse, Winnie the Pooh, and a great sound system with a fun party mix.

On the way over we saw a long procession of big Ganesha floats and statues on flatbed trucks all headed to the ocean, our driver told us. I must have been mistaken when I said that last weekend was the culmination of the festivities. As a friend commented, "It never ends."

The tradition is to put your Ganesha statue out to sea to gain the full benefit of his blessings. When Widi suggested that we drive out to Marina Beach to see the procession and ceremony, our driver said it was a little dangerous and that there were riot police ready because there was fighting between Muslims and Hindus the day before. And here we are in the holy month of Ramadan and still people can't get along.

At the picnic I volunteered to let students throw wet sponges at my face as part of a fund raiser for Habitat for Humanity. It wasn't so bad. We also helped serve the food and drinks. John had fun with some of the younger kids and his new 8th grade friends.

Today we went out to the beach, heading again for the Italian restaurant, “Belle Ciao.” We brought our neighbor’s biodegradable Ganesha statue to send out into the sea, and saw some other people sending theirs out. You really have to double-click on the image to see how those guys are carrying their statues out.

We found the restaurant around 5:30 and were informed that it didn't open till 6:30. We headed back home, too hungry to wait; another failed attempt. It was a busy and festive night at the beach with lots of families enjoying the holiday ritual.

Teddy

I was saddened along with everyone else to hear of Ted Kennedy's passing this week. For all his foibles and royal birthright, he was a champion of the masses as we have all seen in the media this week. If you haven't seen this clip, it's worth a listen. It tells of his personal encounter with our broken health care system when his son lost a leg to cancer. It is a powerful reminder of why it is so important that all people are covered.

I have my own story of getting sick while traveling in Scotland years ago and being treated overnight in a hospital, given medications and sent on my way without having to pay anything. I was so worried the whole time that the money I had for a month in Scotland would be wiped out. I could hardly believe my good fortune and how differently people live in places where everyone is taken care of regardless of financial wealth. I really hope we can do it this time.

The SUV

Here's Widi with our car coming into our apartment complex after a hard day at work. It's bigger and higher than most of the other vehicles on the road, and that is very reassuring. It's still a huge act of faith getting out there with the chaos that is urban India. Our driver is very cool and polite on the road and realizes that he's got a certain advantage with such a big vehicle. You can see that it even has a big grill on the front, which gives it an even more intimidating look. I just breathe deeply and trust that the universe always has my back.

Ganesha's Birthday Celebration

This weekend was the culmination of about ten days of celebrating the birthday of Lord Ganesha, son of Shiva and Parvati, whose head was cut off as a child, and an elephant was walking by at the time, and, as the story goes, that's why he has the head of an elephant.

Although I had the opportunity to spend several hot hours visiting an Indian colleague's temple and traditional celebration at her mother's house, I passed it up and listened instead to the still small voice inside me. It was saying, "Spa."

I made my appointments at The Park Hotel, which I had on good authority was the place to go. This is the kind of place the Mumbai terrorists would target, opulent and filled with expatriates. The thought even crossed by mind riding over there how cool it would be if our driver's name was James rather than John. I could say things like, "The Park, James," and "Home, James."

The spa was nice, but the pedicure room was rather ordinary. They served me strong coffee and biscuits and scrubbed off a good pound of skin from my feet, trimmed, massaged, and painted. Just $10, ladies, the top of the line in all Chennai. The facial was quite a disappointment, however, even though the setting was perfect, soothing music, fragrances, running water, and dimmed lights. It was light on massage, no hand or neck massage at all, no steam or extraction, just a mask. So for $30, it was not up to par. Should have tried a massage instead. Still, I left feeling relaxed, pampered and thoroughly exfoliated.

On Saturday evening, we took a long walk on the beach searching for the cute little Italian restaurant both Widi and I had heard was nearby and right on the beach. We walked in both directions, asked several clueless passersby, and later gave up, went home and made macaroni and cheese.

There were fireworks that sounded like small bombs all Sunday afternoon, and in the evening Widi and I walked to our neighborhood temple to take in the Ganesha birthday celebrations. John could not be persuaded to join us. A group of women were chanting and drumming on a stage and loudspeakers were turned up to the top. People had made an elaborate Ganesha float and were lighting candles and praying around it. People came in and out of the temple, some with offerings. Along the road we saw people just praying at random spots. There were balloons and toys for kids and a general festive air. We took some photos and walked back home. The fireworks went on into the night. And I said a little prayer of my own to Lord Ganesha, the god of wisdom, prosperity, and good fortune. Truly he has smiled on us.

An Evening with MJ

Last night we packed up the car and drove to the Museum Theater downtown for a tribute concert to Michael Joseph Jackson, 29 Aug. 1958-25 June 2009.

It started off shaky with canned music and dancers. They were skilled enough, but the whole thing was rather hokey. But as the evening progressed, it was apparent that in India there is a lot of love and respect for "MJ" as they referred to him on stage. There was an act of doctors who played a couple instrumental tunes, including I'll be There, with a soulful sax on lead, and a children's choir that did a song with the refrain, "I just want to say, they don't really care about us." All the acts had an interesting slide show in the background that either went with the era of the song (Jackson 5, solo career, visiting orphanages, aids victims) or the content of songs Jackson had written. I didn't even know he wrote songs. There was also a little fog machine going for some songs, for effect, and a short video, "From Indiana to India," which showed how Jackson, born in Gary, Indiana, has had such a great influence on Bollywood dance moves. Then they had the music director from our school come up, talk briefly about how he'd used Jackson's music throughout his career and sing a solo. There was a lot of love for the music and the man.

The show was progressing along nicely when a local group with several vocalists and musicians was introduced with, "And now, you all know 'Subject to Change.'" The crowd went wild--and with good reason. This all-Indian group was talented. They did a long set of old and more recent, ABC, Billy-Jean, Thriller, Black or White...I don't even know the music very well, but it was amazing. A couple of the singers really hit the high notes and had the sound of Jackson's voice. There were a couple other acoustic soloists of note, one did a great rendition of Man in the Mirror and the other of Ben. It all culminated with getting all the performers on stage, including the kids choir and a little boy who moonwalked, and sang "We are the World" as the crowd swayed with cell phones lit facing outward. It was quite a moment, as you can imagine, of American cultural pollution at its very best.

Food, Glorious Food

We are all reveling the the great food here. Except for fish and shrimp, which we have about once a week, we've gone completely vegetarian. It's so easy to do with all the great beans, tofu, sauces, noodles, curries, and cheeses. In the teachers' room at school two days a week they have Thai food and two days Iranian. Both are so amazing. The Iranian in particular was a surprise with nice salads, humus, different kinds of rice and vegetable dishes. And, both kids and teachers get a whole hour for lunch--unheard of in public schools. It's like a mini-vacation!

Even John gets a menu with an array of choices from Korean, Thai, and then there's this guy from Southern California who caters Mexican/American, and even Pizza Hut has a piece of the school lunch action. So each day there are two or three different choices, which he orders and pays for two weeks in advance.

And then there's our cook, Suresh, who does a really nice job keeping the spices subtle enough even for John. And with the heat and all the work starting up a new year, we haven't really gotten into a very regular exercise routine. It could be a dangerous combination...at a fun restaurant we ordered ice cream sundaes after dinner on Saturday night. We got a kick out of one sundae that was named, "The last time ever I saw my waist."

Our Students

Our students are the children of multinational corporate employees with the most kids coming from South Korea. There are also a fair number of French and Americans in the school. Also a handful of families from Japan, Sweden, Denmark, Spain, the UK, Australia, Mexico, and Germany. It's a great mix. So, parents from those non-English-speaking places are sending their kids to the American International School with little or no English to get an education and to learn English. We're working with well-off, well-educated, and well-behaved kids. It's nice.

In Chennai, the working class people speak Tamil, and when they speak English, it's very difficult to understand them. They speak really fast with the stress and intonation in all the wrong places. Yet they think they're speaking normal English, so it gets a little tricky.

Middle class Indians, for the most part, speak a beautiful Queen's English with a soft lilting accent and are very easy to understand. Many of the Indian schools and universities use English as the medium of instruction, but then there are many people who don't attend those schools. So the language on the street is Tamil, and I'm not sure if there is an English language school industry like there is in so many other places. In reading back over this, I realize how elitist I sound, referring to the non-standard English as "wrong." They are wonderful, generous people; it's just that we can hardly understand them.

John, our son, just said, unprompted, as he pulled out his Spanish homework, and this is a first:


"I enjoy school. Thoroughly. I may regret saying this, and don't quote me on this, but I would actually consider staying a second year."

The City Center

We learned how truly large the expanse of city was yesterday late in the day when we told our driver that we wanted to go to a particular mall where there were purportedly having some great sales on Western clothes. John wanted to get a thin sweatshirt for when it gets too cold in classes, and Widi needed long pants and long-sleeved shirts, of all things in this heat, which is the level of formality at high school.

It took us nearly an hour to get there. The city goes on and on, block after block. There are some gorgeous five-star hotels and rambling modern malls that rise up from the small "sweets and snacks" shops and various store fronts and street vendors, and as usual the traffic was snarled. We saw Mariner's Beach near City Center, where ships come in, and the famous St. Thomas of Aquinas Church, where he died apparently.

When we finally arrived, the mall was modern and gleaming with parking in the basement. John found some clothes and Widi bought a bunch of stuff. Nothing we wanted was on sale, however, but were just happy to find something we liked. We looked at wool and silk carpets while we waited the 20 minutes for them to shorten all Widi's pants. They are so beautiful. We're thinking of investing in some nice carpets for our apartment here, and of course, to bring back.

We were in the area of the movie theaters, too, but after another fifty minutes getting back to our relatively quiet neighborhood, I'm not too eager to go back downtown any time too soon. I'm quite happy in our corner of the city, 10 minutes from the school, close to the beach.

The First Week of School

It's Friday night. Widi is out at a TGIF happy hour, John is babysitting for the two kids pictured in the first post, and I'm here enjoying a couple cold Kingfishers and just chillin'.

Well, as it turns out, I'm part of the elementary administrative team, only teaching 90 minutes a day, and managing the ESL department...coordinating new student testing, making schedules, and holding meetings. I'm excited to meet my fourth grade absolute beginners on Monday morning. Widi's loving his advanced-level high school students and his low beginners; he's taking over the ESL computer lab and helping everyone, everywhere, as usual.

It's been a week of harrowing rides with a maniac auto-rickshaw driver. The fumes you won't get from the video clip, but the bumping, two-wheel turns, and constant horn-honking will give you a little of what it's like. Notice John in the rear view mirror. Today, however, we got our 2007 Tata Safari Decor, a 7-seat SUV. The rule of the road here is bigger is better. It will be a nice travel vehicle with room for friends and any guests who come to visit. What a difference it was to have John, our wonderful non-deathwish driver, and air-conditioned quiet on our ride home today.

It reaches 100-103 degrees Fahrenheit every day and is quite humid. Someone made the comment recently, "What till it gets hot." Evidently, May and June is the real hot season when temperatures really soar. I can't imagine it any hotter than it already is. So we'll be high-tailing it out of here as soon as school is out in early June! It appears that Pat is close to getting a lease signed by three undergraduate boys who will be out of our house at the end of May...

John has had a great week. The global recession has hit some of the multinationals and enrollment is down at the middle and high school, so there are only 8 students in his English/Social Studies classes and 12 in Algebra/Science. He loves his teachers and has made several friends. He's a happy boy. Couldn't convince him to go out for swim team, however, but he is interested in playing volleyball. He was so excited go out babysitting tonight; of course, it didn't hurt that Widi said if he charged 100 rupees/hour, the equivalent of $2/hour, he'd match it. He was very excited to see the little 4 and 6 year olds. He's hoping for gigs with the two-year-olds, and I bet those parents are too.

Here's a picture of Latchmi and Sonia the two lovely front-office receptionists at school.

Here's Suresh with dinner, all covered because we came home late after shopping (with the maniac) for a printer and John's school supplies. The Commute clip is not uploading very easily; I'll try adding it again later...

First Impressions

There is quite a bit of the old British colonial days in our pace and ease of life here during our first week in Chennai. Our sprawling apartment has high ceilings, overhead fans (and AC), and an assortment of heavy wooden furniture. Our two servants, Suresh, the cook, is young and energetic and prone to giggles, and John, the driver, is older, wiser and has an easy smile. They help us with every task and problem that arises.

During the first week the school took us out each evening to the best hotel restaurants and then to a lovely beach resort an hour south of here on Saturday. John played older cousin for the younger children at these events, and everyone is in love with his "buddha aura," as one teacher put it. It has been an extraordinary welcome complete with open bars and top notch food at every stop.

There are loads of trees in Chennai, along the road from our apartment to the beach, which is eight-minute walk, and all over the city. It is a very nice feature in a crowded Asian city. The photo is a shot from the school, overlooking the cricket fields to the booming new construction nearby. Chennai is home to many multinationals, and so our school has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years.

Life is here is very agreeable for us so far. It's quite hot, but the food is *fantastic* and the people are so helpful and kind. I still have yet to set up my new camera, so stay tuned for more photos and stories about this fascinating place.