Immigration and Registration

This morning I had to go down to the Immigration office here in Chennai to register my presence here in India. You are probably asking "haven't you lived in India for almost 10 months? Why are you just down registering that you live there?" Well, these are the questions that I was asking.

Well this story really starts way back in June when we moved here. S and I headed down to the Immigration office to register. This must be done within 14 days of arriving in India. There is a company that helps us with this process as there are a lot of forms and paperwork involved. Since S is here on an employment visa, this is a very important step that he has to complete in order to get his employment card here. It also has something to do with making sure that the appropriate income taxes are paid on his working here (yes, believe it or not, the U.S. is not the only country where income taxes are paid).

When we arrived at the office in June, S was able to register without any problems. It was a completely different story for me though. All of the appropriate paperwork was completed and ready for me to register. However, the immigration officers took one look at my passport and wouldn't let me register. On my India visa in my passport, there is a special endorsement that says "REGISTRATION NOT REQUIRED, IF CONTINUOUS STAY ON A SINGLE VISIT DOES NOT EXCEED 180 DAYS." They told me to come back in December if I hadn't left the country. Well I have never bothered to go back as I left India in July, September, October, November, December, and February. I have never ever came close to staying here for 180 consecutive days.

I thought it was a little weird that I didn't have to register because everyone else I know (spouses who aren't working) had to register. I was the only one anyone had ever heard of who didn't have to register. We checked into this further through S's office, and it was confirmed that I was OK with not registering. Also, I figured if there was a problem with this that I would find out on one of my many exits or entrances through immigration at the airport. Nothing has ever been said there so I haven't really thought much about it lately.

However, now S and I are in the process of renewing our India visas. We were only given a one year visa, and even though we didn't move here until the middle of June, our visa was issued at the beginning of May. It actually is much harder to get a visa renewal than it is to get an initial visa. From what I have been told, we will be given a 3 month renewal visa. During those 3 months, we have to do more paperwork, and I think they check to make sure the income taxes have been paid. After this, we will then be given another visa that will be valid for 9 months. At that point, we will be good for about 3 months at which point the process starts all over again.

Anyway, during this process of renewing S's employment visa (his is much more important than mine as I am really just added on to his paperwork as being the spouse), it was determined that I would now finally have to register with immigration in order for S to get another visa. So, I went down to the office this morning. A representative from the company who is helping us with this mess met me there with all of the paperwork. First, I had to stand in one line so it could be determined what the next line would be that I would stand in. The guy in the first line didn't understand why I was registering. My representative had to explain to him what was going on. I was then given a number and told to go into another room and wait at a certain counter for my number to be called. When I went into this room, my number was already up, so I didn't have to end up waiting at all. However, then because my representative couldn't come into the room with me, I had to explain why I was wanting to register. Finally the guy behind the counter understood enough to go ask another guy about me. It was finally determined that yes I would be allowed to register. However, of course, it couldn't be quite that simple. One of the required forms wasn't in the packet of paperwork. Luckily, it was just a copy of a page out of my passport. My representative ran outside and to another building to get a copy made for me. Finally, after standing in line again, I was good to go. Now, I just have to go back on Wednesday to pick up the registration forms. Hopefully everything will go smoothly on that day.

The worse part of this whole experience is that the Immigration office isn't air conditioned. So for anyone reading this who will have to partake in this activity, just be prepared for a hot room full of a bunch of sweaty, smelly people. Not fun, not fun at all.

Goodbye Visitors, Hello New Visitors

Well I successfully dropped Diane and Beth off at the airport last night. They had a 4 am flight out of Chennai and should be landing in Chicago on Sunday afternoon around 3:30 pm or so. There is a little concern with them flying back as they are flying on British Airways through London. Heathrow airport in London has just opened a new terminal specifically for British Airways flights. There have been all sorts of stories coming out of London about how disorganized this new terminal is. Flights have been cancelled, bags have been lost, and it just sounds like there is general chaos in this new Terminal #5. When Diane and Beth left, they were actually scheduled to fly into and out of Terminal #4, so we are crossing our fingers that none of this changes.

It was great having Beth and Diane here. I think they really enjoyed the trip, and it sounds like they both would be willing to come back for another visit. We would definitely welcome another visit from them, or from anyone else for that matter. Thanks again to the both of them for giving up their spring break to spend it in India. Not a typical spring break, but definitely an unforgettable one for them.

I no more than had dropped them off at the airport, came home for a few hours of sleep, and woke up to greet new visitors who will be staying for the next 8 days.

Millie the dog and Cleo the kitten will be staying with us while their owners are on vacation. While I'm jealous that I'm not on vacation as well, I'm really looking forward to having a little bit of activity in the house again. Going from three pets to none sure makes things quieter around our home. These two sure look innocent enough in this photo, don't they???

The Final Guest Blog by Beth

First off, I would like to thank Sharmishtha for the comment to my last blog and explaining why overseas visitors are charged more for admissions to things.

Next on my list is to share a picture of an elephant. Before I came over, my brother-in-law requested a picture of an elephant. While I have been here, I have learned many different things. One of the things I have learned is that this is really an Asian elephant because of its small ears and not just because we are in India. (African elephants have the bigger ears.)

There were a couple more pictures I would have liked to taken, but did not get my camera out quick enough. I was not able to get a good picture of the trash under the sign about keeping the town clean. I also did not get a picture of the sign for cows crossing the road or a picture of the five cows crossing a major road here.

However, here are some random pictures that I was able to get. This is a picture of a four passenger vehicle. It is hard to see, but there is a girl in front of the guy (she was sleeping and thus her head is laying forward).

This is a sign to pay one rupee to use the bathroom. We saw a couple places like this. It was also different for me to pay an extra fee at some places to use my camera.

I don't think Julie's driver reads this, but I also want to thank him for taking us to all the places we went this week. I also appreciate him picking us up and taking us to the airport during the middle of the night.

Since I have thanked a couple people in this blog, I should also thank our hosts for the week. I am not sure they have officially invited us back yet, but my mom said she would come back. I would also come back.

I am sure on the long flight home I will think of more things I should written here. However, I should go get ready to leave. I will need to put on my warmer clothes of jeans and a long sleeve shirt to head back to the Illinois weather. I am hoping the weather is warmer now than when we left. However, I know it will be a shock because it will not be 85 to 95 degrees.

Guest Blog #2 by Beth

I have made it to Thursday night here. I would have to say now I have experienced many different things in India. One of those things is that things often break here and it may take a while to fix. It is 6:00 pm here and the plumber has not been yet. I am guessing we may see him tomorrow at the earliest since it will be getting dark soon.

India is not the cleanest place I have been. So it did not bother me too much to go out today without being able to shower. I think this is why I find some humor in this sign.

Maybe in my next guest blog I will post a picture of the trash all over below this sign and across the street.

The next thing that I have noticed here besides the trash is the amount of motorbikes. I see more Honda motorbikes here in one day than I have seen in my life time in the U.S. Here is a picture of a very small portion of the amount we see everyday.

Here is my guess of the ways people get around here :

by car - 1%

by walking - 10%

by bus - 15%

by rickshaw - 25%

by motorbike - 49%

Here motor bikes are as good as cars. You can even carry "laptop" computers. This is a picture of one of the three we have seen since I have been here. The other two were the PC and this one is the monitor.

In the U.S., usually it does not matter where you are from for the cost of admissions for something. Here Overseas visitors are required to pay more...like yesterday when we were at Dakshina Chitra.

One of the things we did yesterday at Dakshina Chitra was watch a folk dance. Here is a picture of the peacock putting a lei over my mom's head during the folk dance.

I have not looked too hard, but yesterday was the first day I have seen chain restaurants here that we have in the U.S. We had a snack when we were at the mall at Subway. Then we ate at Pizza Hut last night. The total for the four of us to eat supper last night was 509 rupees. This is equal to about $12.75. This was for two medium pizzas, eight slices of garlic bread, and two liters of bottled water.

A Busy Day

After an easy day yesterday, today was a very busy day of sightseeing and shopping with my cousin and aunt. We only got home a little bit ago, and being that I'm really tired, I will work on posting some more photos of our outings tomorrow.

Tomorrow will probably be a slow day as we won't be going anywhere too quickly. We came home tonight to find out that a pipe to the hot water tank has burst. So, now we don't have any hot water, and thus showering will be extremely cold...maybe we should go out for a nice long walk to be hot and sweaty so the cold shower will feel good. Right now, we are all pretty smelly after being out all day today, and honestly we could probably just go out tomorrow without showering and no one would even notice. However, I don't think that is going to happen. American standards on b.o. are a little higher than Indian standards. Hopefully, the plumber will show up first thing in the morning to fix the pipe. Hopefully, but probably not. I'm not holding my breath. Actually, I'm not holding high hopes that it will be fixed by the end of the day tomorrow just knowing how these types of things go here in India. Oh well, at least this shows Diane and Beth some of the normal frustrations of living here...wouldn't want them to go back to the U.S. and tell everyone that life here is smooth as butter!

So, anyway, I'm off to bed now. More updates tomorrow.

A "Rock"y Day in India

On Monday, I took Beth and Diane sightseeing to Mahabalipuram (also known as Mamallapuram). This town is located about 25 minutes south of our house. It is a nice drive down to it as there isn't much traffic. This town is known for it's rock carvings. I'm not big into history, so the historical monuments don't interest me for their background and meaning. However, just the thought that the carvings and such are hundreds of years old boggles my mind. There isn't anything in the U.S. that even comes close to being this old.

The first stop in Mahabalipuram was the Shore Temple. Above is a photo of me and Diane standing in front of one of the carved temples. This temple has seen better days as it is showing it's age due to being weathered by the wind, rain, and sea. Of course, it does date back to the 7th century...I guess when I'm that old I'll probably be looking a little rough also!

Next stop on our tour was the lighthouse. Here is a photo of India that actually shows the beauty of the country. Doesn't everyone want to come see for themselves??? However, the real reason for stopping at the lighthouse was to see the monkeys.

The monkey population was a little disappointing as we only saw 3 or 4 monkeys. Last time I was here, I saw probably close to 15 to 20 monkeys. This little guy was very entertaining to watch. He kept trying to balance on the handrail, but then he would start to fall and have to grab on.

After the lighthouse stop, it was time for lunch. We went to a beach resort and ate lunch along the ocean. Beth and Diane commented that it felt like they were back in Hawaii...they were lucky enough to have went there a few years ago. After a nice relaxing lunch, it was time for more sightseeing.

The Five Rathas was the next place we visited. Once again, this place has a bunch of history and each of the carvings represents a Hindu god's chariot (or something like that). There are two very cool things about this place however. The first being that all of the carvings you can see in the above photo are made out of one piece of rock or stone. It must have been one very large rock to begin with! The second thing that amazes me about this place is that all of these carvings were buried under sand until about 200 years ago when they were uncovered by the British. These monuments also date to the 7th century. So my questions are when, how, and why were they buried in sand? Also, how come they remained buried for so long?

Here is Beth standing by the life sized carved elephant. Unless we end up going to the zoo, it will probably be the only elephant that she sees while in India (sorry Robb).

Our final stop of the day was at Krishna's Butter Ball. Essentially all it is is a large rock that looks like it should be rolling down the hill but for some reason doesn't. I was telling Diane and Beth that this is about as exciting as India gets. They travel about 10,000 miles to see a large rock! However, then we were talking that it is really no different than traveling to see Mt. Rushmore, which is also just a large rock. So, now this is known as the Mt. Rushmore of India.

Beth and I did have fun trying to roll the rock on to the Indians sitting in the shade under it. I'm in the white shirt and Beth is in the pink shirt. Personally, I think they are a little stupid to be sitting under it...if I tried that, knowing my luck, it would be about the time that the rock decided that it wanted to finally roll down the hill, and I would be a pancake!

Even though Mamallapuram isn't overly exciting, we made the best of it and had a great time. By the end of the day, we were hot, sun burnt, and tired! This was my 4th trip there, and I'm sure I'll probably make at least 4 more before I leave Chennai. Every time I go though, I see sometime new or learn something else that I didn't know before. Maybe I'll be a history buff by the time we move...maybe, but probably not.

Easter in India

Saturday night we got ready to go to bed and realized that we didn't have any fresh carrots for the Easter bunny. Therefore, we decided to leave him a can of carrots instead. However, we forgot to leave him a can opener, and thus, he got mad and didn't leave us anything! Oh, and by the way, for those of you who don't already know this, the Easter bunny comes up through the sewer pipes...or at least that is what my dad has always told me.

Here is the group of us in our yard. There is me, S, my cousin Beth, and my aunt Diane. Aren't we a good looking group??? We were going to have an Easter egg hunt in the yard...but then thought we might find more than just eggs...geckos, snakes, bugs, rats, lizards, frogs, etc...if we went searching too much through our bushes, so we opted not to have the egg hunt.

We gave our driver the day off for Easter. Normally, we give him Sundays off anyways, but he was willing to work since my family was visiting. However, he is Christian, and we felt that it was important for him to go to church with his family for Easter. Besides, we were easily able to entertain ourselves around the house. After an Easter lunch of chicken casserole, green bean casserole, and canned pears, we played some games. Then we decided to walk to the beach.

This photo of Diane and Beth almost makes the India beach look pleasant. Almost, but not quite!

This is a photo of a couple of the fishermen "walking" their boat down the beach. At first, we thought that they were putting the boat in the water to go out fishing. However, they were just moving the boat down the beach. The guy in front (in the white colored shirt) is pulling the boat with a rope while the guy near the boat is poking it with a stick to keep it out in the water.

On our way home from the beach, some cows had shown up on our road to eat the trash. The resort next to us had some big parties over the weekend, and I guess they have never heard of garbage bags as all of the cups and plates were just dumped in a pile on the side of the road. That is our house in the background, and you can see that our road is a little muddy (and quite bumpy) from all of the rain we have been receiving.

Here is a photo of me standing in front of our gate with one of our security guards. Not a great photo of me, but it's a good picture of our house.

This is a photo of our new neighbors. This "house" was built in about two hours a few weeks ago. It is built up against the backside of our wall. I haven't actually seen anyone in it yet, but I'm guessing someone will be moving in soon. We also have a similar type house on the property on the backside of our house. A very stark contrast to our house.

Anyway, that was our exciting Easter day in India. It was good to spend it with some family members. Now, I'm looking for some more family members to come spend 4th of July with us...any volunteers???

Guest blogging by Beth

For those of you who are frequent blog readers you may have heard J talking about her aunt and cousin coming. We are here. J told me I could be a guest blogger, so I am going to share my experience and thoughts so far.

Mom and I arrived here very early Saturday morning. J was very easy to spot at the airport. (I believe she was the only blond I saw.) We then met her driver. He is very nice. It took us about 45 minutes to go from the airport to J's house. I believe we arrived here at around 3 am. J then let us sleep to around 10 am yesterday. We ate breakfast and headed out to see some of Chennai.

I was glad J's driver was with us when a little boy started knocking on our window trying to sell me a puppet. As he went around to the other side, I then had a beggar knocking on the window. The other thing we saw yesterday was about three or four groups of people colored in purple. Yesterday was Holi, a holiday celebrated here. They throw paint on each other.

We ate lunch out at Little Italy. We also went to a hotel for S to get his haircut, the linen store, a grocery store, and one other store.

When we returned last night, I was able to see my first gecko here. It was a little one. I have not seen any Asia elephants yet. (My brother-in-law wants a picture of one.)

Today is Easter here. J's driver is off today for the holiday and does not usually work on Sundays. We are going to eat lunch and then walk to the beach. I believe J said it is about 3 or 4 blocks from here.

I may see if J will let me guest blog again later this week.

Off to the Airport

So, it's finally time to leave for the airport to pick up the world travelers. I did end up getting a few hours of sleep. However, I'm still glad that it isn't my job to drive at this hour of the night. Hopefully, my driver was able to get some rest as well...however, I doubt he got much as he told me that he was going to church being that it was Good Friday. Luckily for him, S isn't going to work tomorrow, and the rest of us won't be venturing out of the house at too early of a day either. Well time to go...and by the way, it's still pouring rain.

Rain, Rain Go Away

It poured rain this morning. So much so that it rained in through our kitchen air conditioner. Raining in through odd places is actually very common here in India. We also get water running down the walls in at least four different places. We are lucky though as some people have water come in through the electrical box and outlets.

Anyway, it let up raining for a few hours, but then got really muggy. It has now been pouring rain again for a couple of hours. All of this rain (it rained for 4 days straight last week while I was gone) is very unusual for this time of the year. I asked my driver about it, and he said that there is a cyclone that is causing all of this rain.

With it being rainy, my friend and I decided that it would be a good day to play Scrabble (I won't even rub it in to her that I beat her by A LOT). I was entertaining her while her kids had friends over as there was no school today due to it being Good Friday. The kids did end up swimming for a little bit. Anyway, spending time at her house was a good way to kill a few hours today.

Now, I'm just waiting for it to be time to go to the airport. Let's see only about 8 more hours to wait. My aunt and cousin have left London (or at least I'm assuming they are on the flight), but the flight is running about 30 minutes late. Ugh...let's just make a long day a little bit longer!

Well, I'm off to go see if we have water coming into the house in any other weird spots. This is India, so probably so!

Patiently Waiting

Today is going to be a very long day. My aunt and cousin arrive very, very late tonight...or maybe it would be more accurate to say very, very early tomorrow morning. Anyway, they are on their way. My cousin left a phone message that they were on the plane and getting ready to take off. I have checked their flight status, and it looks like they left a few minutes late...nothing that will affect the time they arrive here. They have to stop in London to change planes.

So, my long day of patiently waiting begins. What shall I do? I was going to run to the grocery store for a few items. However, S needs the car, so that is out. That's OK though. It just means that my cousin and aunt can go to the store with me tomorrow. They can see where I shop and what selection I have...or more accurately, what little selection I have. I was also going to go to my friend's house to go swimming today. However, it's been pouring rain off and on all night long, so I'm not sure much swimming is going to be taking place today. We'll see though...here in Chennai it can be pouring rain one minute and the next minute it can be clear blue skies...so there is always hope that it will turn out to be a nice day.

It looks like I will have to go to Plan B for what to do today. I guess I could always be productive and get caught up on some paperwork. Yeah right...I seriously doubt that is going to happen. I could always do some scrapbooking. Maybe, maybe not...just depends on what mood I'm in. Probably the best bet on how I'll spend my day is surfing the internet for awhile, finishing up some laundry, baking some muffins, and reading a good book. I'll have to find a good no-brainer book to read...you know, the type that you don't have to think real hard about while reading, but yet the book catches and keeps your attention, and before you know it, a couple of hours have passed and the pages are starting to blur. Also, I should probably take a nap.

Anyway, I guess I'll go find something to do...and I'll be patiently waiting...even if this means twiddling my thumbs all day long.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

In honor of St. Patrick's Day, I'm writing this post in green text color. Of course, I'm not sure how it is going to show up on the blue background on my blog...probably will just look black.

Nothing too exciting going on here. I spent Sunday cleaning out the freezer. It is done, but I still have to work on the fridge side some more. However, at least the fridge side doesn't have a colony of "sesame seeds" living in it. Those stupid little bugs crawled into every little space and crevice that there is in the freezer. The stupid things don't come off very easily either. I had to use a toothpick to flick them off of the shelves before I could run them through the dishwasher. There are a couple of the bugs that I just couldn't get to...and were still attached after the run through the dishwasher. S told me that I would just have to let it go and live with the fact that they are in my freezer. I guess I will, but still...yuck!

My brother did call me with a good suggestion on how to clean the freezer without gagging. He told me to put Vick's VapoRub in my nose. He has had to pick up a few dead bodies that were past ripe, and this is what they use to keep from smelling the odor (he's a part time EMT). Sure enough, the trick worked. Of course, it says right on the jar of Vick's to not put into your nostrils. Heck, it worked, and I'm still alive without any side effects of having it in my nose. So if you ever need to go near a refrigerator or freezer that has went out (or a dead body), stick some Vick's VapoRub up your nose first.

Today, besides working on the fridge, I need to pick up the rest of the house. My aunt and cousin get in very late Friday night/Saturday morning, so I have to get ready for their visit. Yesterday, I also got the Easter decorations out. Now, I need to figure out what to do for Easter dinner. I was going to make chicken, but my stomach is still turning at the mention of the word chicken. In fact, when I was in the grocery store this weekend, I almost lost it when walking past the freezer with the frozen chicken in it. The sad thing is that chicken is our main meat here, so I need to find a way to quickly get over this experience.

Well, I guess I should go look to see if any leprechauns left any pots of gold around my house. This is very possible with the messy state that it is in right now. I could be rich and not even know it! So, Happy St. Patty's Day to everyone! Don't forget to wear your green!

P.S. Happy Birthday to TB!

Those Aren't Sesame Seeds

Disclaimer: If you have a weak stomach or are eating while reading this, you probably had better not read any further.

Do you ever get a feeling? Well I had a feeling before I left for the U.S. that one of these times when we are gone that one of our fridges is going to go out, and that we would return to a gigantic mess. I just didn't know that it was going to be this time.

It's only 7 am, but I'm already done eating for the day. I'm not sure I can even stomach the possibility of thinking of eating anything today. After procrastinating all of yesterday, I decided that I had better tackle the task of cleaning out the fridge before S gets home tonight.

Yesterday, I had briefly (like for less than two seconds) opened the fridge and the freezer to see what I was going to be dealing with. I removed two containers from the freezer of what once was chili. Being that it is just S and I, there is always too much food, and thus we eat a lot of leftovers. Chili is just one of those things that makes a huge batch, so I always freeze individual containers of it. So, I pulled out the containers of the food-formerly-known-as-Julie's-chili. Yeah, let's just say that chili that has been frozen, then thawed in the freezer, then left to sit for who knows how many days in an 80 plus degree room, and then refrozen is just plain disgusting! It had a good case of mold growing on it...and I'm pretty sure that frozen mold tastes no better than normal mold.

So, after disposing of the two things of chili yesterday (I was able to salvage the Tupperware containers), I decided that the cleaning of the fridge and freezer would have to wait. Just the stench alone from briefly opening the fridge/freezer lasted throughout the day. Of course on the positive side, I don't think geckos like the smell of rotten food!

So, this morning I got up early and decided that I had no choice but to tackle the mess. Well the containers of chili were in a drawer in the freezer that also contained packages of chicken breasts and a bag of frozen shrimp. Let's just say that I'm darn glad that I kept these items in the drawer and not on a regular shelf. I probably just saved myself hours of scrubbing out the freezer...although I'm sure that I'll still use a considerable amount of bleach in it. Also, I have absolutely no desire whatsoever to eat chicken or seafood any time in the near future. I generally don't have a weak stomach (probably one of the reasons why living in India doesn't bother me), but this morning I came real close on more than one occasion to losing my breakfast. I have three candles burning in the kitchen, and I still have to hold my breath any time I go near this room.

Anyway, so yesterday when I was dumping the containers of chili, I noticed sesame seeds on the outside of the containers. I didn't really think twice about this as I have sesame crackers in the freezer, and it's possible that some seeds may be floating around in the freezer. This morning while further cleaning out the freezer, I realized that those weren't sesame seeds. Nope, those were bugs! They are all over the inside of the freezer. Of course, now that the freezer is back working, the bugs are frozen (and hopefully dead), but talk about GROSS!

What I'm trying to figure out now is whether or not I can salvage crackers, cereal, chips, sugar, flour, brown sugar, etc. that I had stored in my freezer. I pulled the crackers out of the box, and they look OK. Now, I'm just hoping that the plastic they are sealed in is strong enough to have kept the crackers from absorbing the rotten chicken/shrimp smell. I haven't gotten to the flour and sugar yet. I have a feeling that those will have to go in the garbage.

So, the freezer is about half cleaned out. I haven't even started to tackle the fridge side yet. Does ketchup, mustard, jelly, hot sauce, etc. go bad if it is refrigerated, then gets hot, and then is cooled again? I did notice that S has moved one of the bottles of ketchup to the other fridge, so he must have been using it. I guess when he gets home tonight I'll have to ask him if it tastes OK and if he has got sick at all. I'm thinking that I should be able to salvage my chocolate chips and butterscotch chips.

So, why did the refrigerator go out? We have been having major power problems here for a couple of months now. Supposedly, the electrical lines are being fixed, and every week I hear that they will be fixed in one week. In the meantime, the voltage coming into the house is high (or so I've been told), and even with the whole house stabilizer, which is suppose to help keep appliances from getting fried, the power issues have been wreaking havoc in our house. Breakers keep tripping and certain items won't work at different times. Even though we don't pay for the generator fuel, it just isn't feasible to have a generator running 24/7 for days on end. So, we deal with the electrical issues...and the problems created. We have to...this is what we signed up for when we moved here.

Anyway, I guess I should make another run at the cleaning. This is probably going to be an entire weekend project as I'm pretty sure that I won't be able to handle doing the entire thing at once. However, I do need to keep moving on it as I need to make a list of items that I need to replace. Then I can go to the grocery store here to see what I can find, and then I can still have time to beg my cousin and aunt into bringing whatever else I need with them when they come at the end of next week.

So goes my exciting weekend in India! I'm hoping that everyone else is having a much better (and less smelly) time than I am.

Home Sweet Home in India

Well I have made it back to Chennai. No problems with the flights. Maybe it's just me, but it really doesn't seem to take over a day of travel to go between the U.S. and India. I really don't mind it as much as the trip between Beijing and Chicago...that 13 plus hour direct flights was just a killer. Plus, I don't know if it is due to the stop in Germany to switch flights or the timing of the flights, but I don't get jet lag like I did when I was living in China. In fact, I didn't have any jet lag when I arrived in Florida a couple of weeks ago. It's still a little early to tell about the return back to India. I'm sure I'll have it some...only time will tell over the next few days.

Well my welcome back to India is of course in typical India style. Besides S being gone on another business trip, I have been welcomed home by ants, a dryer that isn't working (S claims that it was working yesterday afternoon, so I need to figure out what the problem is), and a bunch of mold and stink in the refrigerator. S had returned home last week to find that the main fridge had stopped working. He managed to get the repair people out to fix it, but he didn't have time to clean it out. Let's just say raunchy is an understatement for the status that it is in right now. So, that will be one of my "fun" tasks for the day.

Anyway, I'm off to shower now. I was too tired to take one last night when I got in...so maybe that smell is me and not the fridge? No, I'm pretty sure it's the fridge!

OK, OK...

I've heard enough of "when are you going to post a new blog." This one is dedicated to those of you who have been waiting patiently for me to write something.

Something.

There I wrote something. Now, being the mean person that I am, I could just post this blog and be done with it. However, I'll be nice and write some more.

I'm packing up and getting ready to go back to India tomorrow. I'm ready. One of the reasons why I haven't posted anything since I have been in Illinois is that there really wasn't anything exciting to report. I've been shopping (buying lots of peanut butter M&Ms for a certain friend of mine who will remain nameless), eating, meeting up with family and friends. Although the trip has been short...and once again I didn't get everything done on my list that I wanted to...I truly am ready to return to my home. I miss S...I miss my bed...I miss warmer weather...plus I need to get ready for my aunt and cousin who will be arriving at the end of next week for their visit. Sure, I'll miss everything that I'm leaving behind in the U.S., but I've also found that every time in the last 1 1/2 years that I have returned to the U.S. that I miss less and less every time I leave. Of course, I still miss my family, friends, and pets. But the little things in life that were once somewhat important to me have slowly been becoming less and less important as time goes by. Other things that were once not of significance in my life have inched their way up the priority list. I guess it is a good thing that my list has flexibility to it. If not, I'm sure the last year and a half would have seemed like an eternity...instead, time has flown by. This week marks the 9 month anniversary of us living in India and the 18 month anniversary of us being out of the U.S. I guess time truly does fly when you are having fun! So, here's to another 1 1/2 years...I hope the next 18 months will be just as grand as the past 18 months have been!

Illinois or Bust

Well, I am currently sitting in the airport in Fort Myers, Florida, waiting for my flight to Atlanta, Georgia. I was pleasantly surprised to find that there is free wireless internet here. In Atlanta, I will have about a 3 hour layover before heading on to Illinois. I'm not sure why I'm heading to Illinois since there is snow on the ground there, and the weather has been beautiful here in Florida after the initial couple days of cold.

My week here in Florida has been very relaxing and enjoyable...even if I had to spend it with my parents and their crazy friends! The 50s party at their park on Friday was a lot of fun...even if I was the youngest person there by at least 20 years.

On Monday, my dad and I along with another guy went down to the Florida Everglades fishing. We caught around 90 fish in about 4 hours, so it was definitely worth the drive down there. They even made me use live crickets as bait. Talk about GROSS! Normally, they fish on Lake Okeechobee, but the lake has been dry the last couple of years on the end that they stay at. So, not as much fishing as normal since they have to trailer the boats around to get water access.

Yesterday, my mom and I went shopping with another lady. I didn't buy much, but just had a good time wondering around a nice, clean environment...and somehow, all of my money seemed to get spent! I'm actually waiting until I get to Illinois to do my major shopping as I don't want to drag stuff around any more than necessary.

Well almost time to board. Will post more if there is free internet in Atlanta.