Week 9!

                 There isn't a whole lot to blog about this week, as KC pretty much covered it with his book that he wrote last week. Also with the camera being "stolen" we don't have any exciting pictures :(. This week we were back in the swing of things with volunteering at the hospital and teaching in the nursing college. KC hasn't had a whole lot of luck with his class-they seem to show up irregularly on a regular basis. He goes and they aren't there, he doesn't go and they are there. My class time changed in the middle of Friday, I'm sitting in Casualty minding my own business (and trying to talk to the 2 new intern students who don't speak English, because they had about an average of 1 patient an hour again) when some of my BSC students come in and say 'please come mam it is your class right now' at 12 pm. I said, no I teach at 3pm-and they said 'no -class time was changed today-med surg is now, go change and come in 5 minutes'. So off I went. I had nothing prepared to teach so I answered some general questions and then they spent 30 minutes teaching me how to write my name in Hindi, and asking questions about the US. They were very excited to find out that I have Facebook and promptly went home that night to request me to be their friend. This week is my last week teaching as we leave for our trip to see the Taj Mahal and the Himalayas, and the teachers needed to have their class back so that they could stay on track with the syllabus.

           KC is now working on drawing the final plans for Pastor James for his new church, parsonage and student hostel. We were able to find a place that sells large drawing paper (that was exciting-one of the students wrote the name of the store in Hindi for me...so we walked down the street holding the piece of paper up comparing it to store front signs to see which one looked the same -and it worked!) and he is making very professional looking plans for the church to pray over and hopefully eventually give to a contractor to build sometime in the future. We are hoping to be able to see him the last week that we are here, and maybe visit the orphanage again.

             This past weekend we were invited to 3 different picnics (KC pointed out that our activities come in spurts...we do nothing, then all the sudden we are invited to everything!) which was fun-we had to turn down one of the picnics with students on Saturday, but Saturday night we went to Gungrail dam with Dr.Chatterjee and his family, as his brother from the US (Nashville, Tennessee) was in town. It was a 'potluck' ...and what in the world do you bring to an Indian potluck??? We brought garlic mash potatoes to give it an American flair. Mom-you would have been proud of our ingenuity. Sunday we spent all day with the OT staff at another dam, where they brought food to prepare and eat there. The cooking is such an adventure in itself. They bring these huge pots and firewood, and then somehow3 hours later we end up with delicious chicken, rice, salad and 'papads' (light crispy fried deliciousness). It is pretty easy because you don't need utensils (you eat with your hands) and you don't have to worry about keeping anything cold (it all gets boiled in a giant pot anyways).  I won't tell you where they got the water for cooking.  We stayed for afternoon tea and then came back around 6 pm. KC and a bunch of the other staff went 'swimming' in the 'waterfall' of the dam, and got soaking wet to cool off from the outrageous heat while I in my white skirt opted to take a nap under a tree instead (it was very nice thank you).

      Wednesday we are taking a train from Raipur to Agra, where the Taj Mahal is, and then from there we hop around to different cities, eventually flying to Darjeeling and the Himalayas. Travel within India is extremely cheap. We hope to see Mount Everest and maybe do some hiking (no not ON Mount Everest!) since we have the opportunity while in India. However, we are glad that we will be heading out of Dhamtari in the end of March as we cannot IMAGINE how hot it must get here in the summer. The coolest days here in March have been hotter then the summer in Ohio. We sit in the apartment and just sweat. I know I know-we will stop complaining about the beautiful sunshine-at least we can be glad that it isn't snowing :).

Raina (and KC)