Can Do Sandhu

Well it’s been a few days since we’ve left Leh and I’ve finally got round to sorting out some photos for this posting. We’re back in the Punjab – it’s much cooler than when we left it….around 38C (instead of 47C) but with the severe humidity it actually feels worse!!!  (Yeah I know – you just cannot win).  But at least the monsoon has finally started.

Anyway – back to Ladakh…I know you’re all itching to know all about it.  We were there for just over a month – I wish I could say we trekked all over the region and conquered many of the 5000 metre passes, but we all too easily got into the Ladakhi way….relax and unwind!!!

Leh (the capital of Ladakh), where we stayed is at 3500 metres altitude…we actually stayed on the outskirts of the town, at a place called Changspa (maybe up to a 100 metres higher).  The altitude took some getting used to – it actually felt worse than the 4000 metre pass we crossed while doing the TransRockies last year.  Maybe it was the lack of training or maybe the drier air in Ladakh had a bearing (the dry barren land sucks any moisture out of the air) but it really took some getting used to.   We stayed at the friendliest place in town, the Oriental Guest House.  It’s a family run affair, mostly we had dealings with brother and sister partnership, Dawa and Phuntsok, who were amazing….very friendly and going out of their way to help wherever possible.  We didn’t do much for the first week – just getting to know some people at the Oriental Guest House, especially Nigel, from Bournemouth in the UK and David from Vancouver (although his accent gave him away as really a Brit too – actually a fellow northerner as he was originally from Lancaster).  We also did the odd walk up the 500+ steps to Shanti Stupa:

Four hundred steps and counting!!!

Shanti Stupa

But the views at the top were well worth the effort.

Worth The Effort

The little patches of green in amongst the sand in the picture above (left and right of Jo’s legs!) is apparently the highest golf course in the world – I’m not a golfing man but I suspect this golf course would provide plenty of bunker practise!!!  Also the larger of the two peaks in the above photo is Stok Kangri, a trekkable 6000 metre mountain.  Over the month of our stay at the Oriental we had several schools (from the UK) come to stay.  They were there with World Adventure – their itinerary included projects at village schools in the area as well as a trek to the summit of Stok Kangri.   Lucky kids – all we had when we were at school was a day trip to London Zoo!!!

Anyway we got chatting to the kids from Stamford High School…they seemed like a great bunch – far more switched on than I was when I was their age (but that’s not saying much!).  We made friends with several of the teachers and World Adventure organisers, especially Sue and Carl from Stamford High and Mr Bolton (erm – I mean, Stuart) from World Adventure….hopefully we’ll be catching up with them again soon.

One downside of Leh was that Jo and I did seem to take it in turns being ill.  Jo started with a cold and I took over with severe heart burn…all in all I think we had a total of about a week each of illness during our stay.  I think it’s the altitude – although we didn’t suffer from altitude sickness we did suffer due to the body having to work harder at altitude, hence in our weakened state we picked up several bugs over the month.  Anyway, once we’d recovered from our first illness phase, we decided to stretch our legs by going for a small hike from the village of Spituk.   This is where the Markha Valley trek (a very popular eight day trek) starts from – we were keen on checking out the start since we were considering doing it.  It turned out to be a hard day – hot and dusty, but it was good to stretch the legs.

Bridge Over The Indus

Buddist prayer flags can be seen all over the region, hanging from just about anywhere.  Write your prayers and let the wind carry them – what a great idea…and they look great.

Prayers In The Wind

We walked along the Indus river for a couple of hours, although the terrain was unchanging we did have some great views across the valley.

View Across The Indus

We also got chatting to a very friendly Pony Man – we should have asked him his rates as we found later in the week that local firms charge silly prices for organised treks.

Back at the guest house we made friends with some Canadians, Alison, Ali and Heidi…and I can safely say that we still haven’t met any Canadians that we have not got on really well with.  It was the Hemis festival so we shared a taxi with Alison, Ali and Heidi, visiting the festival as well as several other gompas (monasteries).  The Hemis festival is a very famous annual event in the region.  Every 12th festival they unfurl, what is reputed to be, the world’s largest thanka (Tibetan Buddhist religious painting on cloth). The last time it was unveiled was in 2004 and so the next time this is revealed will be in 2016, i.e. we didn’t see it!

The weather was a bit strange that day, we basically had everything – sunshine, rain, hail and snow all in the space of a few hours but (once I purchased some warms socks) it was a great day.  The Hemis Festival itself wasn’t really my cup of tea – it was just chaos.  It was horrible seeing so many westerners impose themselves on what is effectively an important day for the local Buddhist population.  The prime seats around the square were predominantly taken by westerners, while the locals fought to try and get a place to sit (typically on the floor while westerners blocked their view).  Also most of the “press” were westerners and they thought it was fine to stick their massive cameras into the faces of the priests – I’m sure they got superb photos…not!

Crowded Hemis

The VIP section – used by army officers and their western guests – was pretty empty.  There was also a sub-VIP section, consisting of a dozen empty chairs.  This was on the ground – in the way of everyone wanting to sit on the floor and watch proceedings – when I asked the soldiers guarding the empty chairs to shift the chairs or let people use them they said “they’re coming” (meaning their guests)….and an  hour later their reply was the same….another hour later they finally got rid of the damn chairs and freed up some prime seating space!!!

Ignoring the crowds though, there were some great sites – just wish I knew what was going on!!!

Masked Priest At Hemis

Dancing Priest At Hemis

Praying For Calm!

Best Seat In The House

After the chaos of the actual festival we headed off to see the inside of some of these great gompas.  It was a refreshing break from the crowds as most of the gompas were deserted – guess everyone was still at the festival.

Tranquilty

Buddhist Deities

Another Buddhist Deity

In the Matho gompa we (the men that is) were allowed in to the oracle room (no not a database room – an all-seeing, questions answered type of oracle!).  The Room Of The Oracles is strictly men only – apparently women would ruin it – I think that’s a great idea….they just needed to put an Xbox in there and a fridge full of beer!!  As it was, the room was dark and ancient – the floor was covered in grain taken from every field in the village to ensure a successful harvest for the next year.  Unfortunately no photos are allowed in the room – shame, as it’s walls were covered with grotesque masks and weapons (no doubt to keep the women out!!).

Architecturaly most of the gompas are pretty impressive – being built on mountains and rocky outcrops (long before they had access to machinery to help them).  Sorry I cannot remember which gompa was which – after a while they all blurred into one.

Gompa

If it wasn’t for Allison and Ali I think the tours of all the gompas would have been a bit tedious, but because Ali’s Hindi was so good and Allison’s knowledge of all things Buddhist was very impressive the monks really warmed to us when they showed us around.  Let’s just say I think we were treated to a better level of service by the monks than I think most other tourists.

The next day (being about a week and a half into our stay in Leh) we decided to do what they call a mini-trek.  We wanted to do a trek under our own steam – and the Likir to Temisgam trek can be done from guest house to guest house,  so no need for guides, ponies, tents etc.  In the end it turned out to be quite a mammoth trek – let’s just say I’ve never been so knackered in my life (and that includes the TransRockies last year).

So rather than hack a write up quickly I’ll leave that for another day – I’d do another posting (or two) on our Ladakh adventures.  Hopefully this little write up (and the photos) are enough to whet your appetite for the moment.

We’re off to Delhi tomorrow – flying to London the day after…so I guess we’ll be back in the UK when I get to complete the Ladakh write-ups.  I’ll try not to keep you waiting too long for it

Regarding my book – I’m stuck on chapter 11 at the moment.  Having been away from my baby (aka laptop) for a whole month I haven’t been able to make any progress on the book…Jo’s netbook’s keyboard is a nightmare to work with.  Ladakh did however provide me with plenty of inspiration so it’s all good.  Looking forward to making some real progress on the book in the coming weeks.

Thanks for reading and hope you like the photos – I’d like to think that it was worthwhile me lugging several kilos of camera equipment around in the Ladakh mountains….guess it’s good training for Nepal (incidently we’ve booked our flights to Nepal – we depart, from Delhi, on the 16th of September!!)

Take care

Sat

This is just a quick posting to let you all know we’re alive and well and that we haven’t falled off the world…

We’ve been in Ladakh for just over a week and we love the place. The region (in the north of India) is nothing like the rest of India…it is relaxed, peaceful, clean and beautiful.

The mountains around Leh (capital of Ladakh) are huge, several sticking their heads up beyond the 6000 metre mark.

Leh is at 3500 metres, so it took some getting used to…the air is pretty thin and very dry.

We haven’t done much trekking as yet, just getting used to the altitude and also getting into the Buddist mentality…nice and slow!!!

Tomorrow we’re off on a four day trek – it’s what they call a baby-trek around these parts. It’s pretty easy as it’s around many villages and we’re able to trek from village to village staying at guesthouses (so no hard core camping as yet). After that we’ll see which way the winds blowing…

The weather here is great too – very cold at night (hence sleeping great) and a blazing hot sun during the day.

Taken lots of pictures but since the wireless broadband card isn’t working here – as there’s very poor mobile phone reception around there – so unable to upload them yet.

You’ll have to wait another 3 weeks before you see the pictures – but take my word for it, it’s awesome!

Jul-ley
Sat

It’s difficult to sleep when you’re angry.

The power keeps going.  Most nights we don’t have power.  On Sunday night the power came back but was not full power (!) – it was only 180 volts (instead of the 240 volts it is supposed to be)…hence it was insufficient to drive the air-conditioning unit in our bedroom.  Last night the power went an hour after we went to sleep, even with the power the AC was struggling to get the temperature in the bedroom down below 32C (90F) but once the power goes, you can feel the temperature creeping up….now I know how a lobster feels!  As it gets hotter, while I try to sleep, I just cannot help thinking about the men in charge of the power grid….and it makes me angry.  The temperature is not much hotter than the unseasonal hot weather we had in April but the power worked fine back then – my father, it appears, was correct (there’s always a first time!) when he said it would all change after the election.  It now appears that the power supply was only consistent because someone was worried about being re-elected, hence made sure all the service providers did their job – now that the political process is over no-one cares.

We have a generator, but it is designed to switch off as soon as power comes back…starting it up is a manual process, hence if the power flicks on and then off, then effectively it switches the generator off.  And that is precisely what the power has been doing around here for the past week – bouncing around like Tigger from Winnie The Pooh.

Also the power has been sending a few surges down the power lines – we’ve blown quite a few fuses lately.  Indian plugs aren’t designed to have fuses but my father keeps insisting on using UK (fused) plugs….his new pastime is “changing the blown fuses”!!

Apparently a whole (neighbouring) village had it’s entire electrics fried the other day when instead of 240 volts they had 500 volts supplied to their appliances!!!

This highlights the two “I”s in India…incompetence and ineptitude.  The incompetence of the power company workers, because I am certain they are aware of the problems but are too busy sitting around in their air-conditioned offices to bother getting these issues fixed in a timely manner, and the ineptitude of the people for accepting it….personally I think the power issues are worth rioting over, rather than the death of a man in Austria.  We are lucky, we have air-conditioning and a generator for backup….I’d hate to think how the people less well off are managing.  They rely heavily on the power to run their pumps to get water out of the ground (the only source of water around here) – so no power also means no water.

People are suffering, maybe even dying but no-one does anything – they simply accept it….actually they like doing something…they like complaining (a bit like I’m doing at the moment).

Complaining is a national pastime around here.

It’s getting hotter and hotter….normally by now nature’s self-regulator kicks in and we have some rain, but the skies are clear blue…..not a sign of a cloud to be seen anywhere.  On the news today they said the monsoon is delayed by 10 days in many parts of India – people need this water now.  Today we hit a record – this picture is for real…in the sun!!!!!

54 Celsius (130 Fahrenheit)

In case you don’t know what you’re looking at – that is 54 CELSIUS (130 FAHRENHEIT) in the sun!!!!!!!  (It actually got a little hotter later – going up to 54.7 Celsius!!)

Incidently the world record is about 51C in the shade…think we’re hitting 47/48C in the shade on a regular basis.  I’m always amazed when we see the world weather forecasts on CNN or BBC World – Delhi is consistently the hottest place on earth.  It’s only recently that the Middle-East has started to match it.  It wasn’t always like this – global warming, pollution and deforestation have taken their toll on the Indian climate.

A good friend of ours, Alan (he’s a Kiwi but we won’t hold that against him!!!), recently sent us this link…it’s an article on how India wants to push the use of solar power.  India is already apparently a world leader in the use of solar power – all the hot water around here is solar heated (though in fairness even the cold water tank’s water is hot at the moment!).  Anyway – solar power is definitely the way to go around here…I’m hoping to do some research on the matter and see if  we can get a grant for installation at my parent’s farm.

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/assets/binaries/national-solar-plan

One important fact highlighted by the above document is that Indian land receives around 4 to 7 kWh of power per square metre.  Wow – that’s incredible…this house uses about 6 kWh at the most.

A whole different meaning!

At least they still spell “welcome” as “wel come” (yes they do use the space!)….at least this makes me a little more relaxed about the Americans spelling colour without the ‘u’ !!

Laters

Sat

This is just a quick posting to let you all know that we’re on the road for the next week and a half, hence may not have internet access…just in case you email or comment (not that many of you seem to bother…boo hoo )

We’re off to Goa for a week.  The flight is on Thursday but we’re having to go to Chandigarh a few days early because the whole of the Punjab will be locked down when they bring the body of the murdered Guru to India, from Austria, on Wednesday.  We’re not looking forward to an extra air-conditionless night in Chandigarh!!!  The original curfew is over by the way…we’re hoping to get our travelling in before it kick-starts again!

We (especially me) are looking forward to Goa – assuming we get there (the monsoon may have come early this year and that usually spells travel chaos).  Steak and chips…there’s a portion in Goa with my name on it…and if I’m really lucky there will be a Jack Daniels to wash it down with.  Am I building myself up for a major let down?  Probably, but there is always hope!

After Goa my brother, Jag, arrives (which incidentally means another extra night or two in Chandigarh without the air-con) but he’s worth it….I think!   It’ll be nice to have a new face around…especially since he’s bringing lots of “goodies” for us.

That’s about it….I did say it would be short and sweet.

See you all when we see you!

Sat & Jo

Large parts of the Punjab (the state we are currently living in) are apparently having large riots.  No-doubt you Brits will have seen something about it on the BBC news or something…no doubt our American audience still doesn’t know what’s going on outside their borders.  (Joke!  Sorry I couldn’t resist).

Anyway apparently some members of the Sikh community cannot stand the fact that a preacher from a low caste Sikh sect is calling himself a Guru.  Someone should point out to these idiots that in Sikhism there is supposed to be no caste system.  Anyway the word Guru means teacher.  As always, idiots will only take the parts of their religion that suit their lack of intelligence.  Someone give them an education…please!  Ah, can’t do that either as they closed the schools down as well today!

Sorry I’m in a grumpy mood – got a bit of a headache.  We’ve had large power cuts recently hence the tube-well that we rely on for our water has been out of action.  I’ve therefore maybe not been drinking as much water as I should be – even though we can always buy water from somewhere.  My father warned me that the power supply would become erratic after the elections (when those in charge no longer worried about lost votes) – guess he was right.

We’ve also had carpenters round for the last few days.  It’s a simple job – if I had the supply of wood then I could have done the job myself in one day.  Anyway – to say they have to be micro-managed is a bit of an understatement.  They thought they had finished putting up kitchen cabinets they had made until my father tugged at one gently.  It came off the wall with ease.  They’re now trying again!  I wish I could say something positive about them but I’m struggling….erm, they have nice teeth (actually they don’t – like I said I am struggling).

Anyway – this was just a quick note to say the Punjab violence isn’t affecting us here in the village – the bus service and train service have pretty much shut down and a lot of the key roads within the state are closed.  But in this heat we have no intention of going anywhere.

Laters,  Sat

Well, we’ve been here a month already and if I’m honest,  this last week, it’s felt like longer but that’s mainly due to the fact I’ve been unwell the past few days and have had too much time to feel sorry for myself! 

Basically we’d gone for a longer run on Sunday morning  as usual but we’d left just a little later than usual so naturally it was hotter.  I’d felt fine during and after the run and it was only by early evening that I started to feel under the weather.  I was aching all over, shivery and getting bad stomach cramps.  Didn’t take much to figure out I was suffering from sunstroke.  I clearly hadn’t drunk enough water following the run. I won’t go into any further detail of my suffering since Sunday, suffice to say I’ve lost a few pounds in weight over the last few days!  Fortunately I’m beginning to feel much better – still quite weak, resting a lot and not eating much other than dry toast for the time being but I’m being well looked after by Sat and mum and dad are also fussing over me (I think they were quite worried and sent out for some drugs this morning but luckily I haven’t needed them – besides, they don’t arrive in the same pristine fashion you get in Boots with your name printed on and the required dosage clearly stated. No, these arrive either in a little clear plastic bag with “emergency” written on it, or they are a cut out square of a blister pack with part of the name of the drug visible  if you’re lucky!). 

Needless to say, I haven’t been up to going to school this week which is a shame but can’t be helped.  Last week was great as I’d found loads of great flashcards on the British Council website.  They covered all the topics I’d gone through with the kids like telling the time, parts of the body, fruit & veg, etc, so I printed them off and took some cellotape with a view to sticking them on the walls. Well the kids loved them! And once they realised they were going on the walls, you can imagine how many little helpers I had all screaming at me to choose them to stick the next one on the bit of the wall next to their desk! Noisy chaos in both Class 6 and Class 7 ensued and drew attention from other teachers who wondered what the noise was all about!  The flashcards have certainly brightened up the classrooms as the walls are bare apart from flaking paint and a few religious pictures.  Let’s see how long they last…

In any case, today is another holiday as it’s voting day for this part of the Punjab and the schools are used as polling centres.  We went along with mum and dad this morning while they cast their vote.  They don’t expect the party they voted for to win outright, they reckon there’ll need to be a coalition government but at least they’ve used their vote.  I think there’s a lot of apathy around this election.  India  needs its own version of Obama to really shake things up but that’s not going to happen for a while yet. 

On a completely different topic but still US related, I was checking out the TransRockies Run website yesterday and I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw who was in one of the teams this year…Dean Karnazas…the God of ultra-distance running and king of  fundraising!!!  Why couldn’t we be doing this year’s run, or better still, why didn’t he do it last year when we were there????  Hopefully he’ll enjoy it as much as we did and decide to do it again next year when Sat and Satpal run.  I’m still trying to persuade my sister, Gill, to run with me but she’s a bit preoccupied with planning her wedding to commit just yet.

And on another tangent altogether, I’ve been watching more TV over the past couple of days since I’ve been house-bound and the English-speaking channels like HBO always have subtitles in English as well. Anyway, the really funny thing is that we were watching “Something’s Gotta Give” with Jack Nicholson and Diane Keaton yesterday afternoon and each time the actor/actress said the word “sex”  or “sexy” or anything starting with the letters “sex” then the subtitles missed out that word completely – and hence lost the sense of the sentence.  We just found it bizarre, for a country which devised the Karma Sutra, they sure are prudish when it comes to the spoken word! 

Think that’s about it for now.  I’m hoping to be fit enough to go back to school tomorrow.  There’s only a couple of weeks left until the end of term.  I’ve been planning what to do for an end of year treat for the kids.  It’s clear most of them are from very poor families so anything we do will probably be much appreciated.  Figured lots of fresh fruit like bananas and mangos will go down well along with ice lollies.  We’ll also take some photos of each of the classes and post them here so you can see for yourselves the little darlings I’ve been teaching!!!

Time for one last laugh…my sister-in-law, Parm, sent me to India with a box of Charbonnel & Walker pink champagne truffles as a treat (long story cut short – on a previous trip to India I had bought a bottle of Taittinger pink champagne at Duty Free in London which I’d carried faithfully throughout our trip and planned on us drinking it when we got to the mountain station of Shimla. In our haste to get off the train at Shimla and escape the eager clutches of the luggage porters, I managed to leave the champagne on the train and never saw it again. Gutted! So the truffles were a reminder but small enough for my rucksack and not likely to be left anywhere). We’d been here over 2 weeks before I even opened the box.  Inside were nestled 7 beautifully pink truffles, each in a little brown case.  We deliberated whether to share with mum and dad and decided that as there weren’t many we’d just keep them to ourselves.  So whenever mum and dad have gone out, we’ve had a truffle.  Then this morning I found the box in the bin…my first assumption was that mum and dad must’ve polished off the last 2 yesterday after we’d gone to bed.  But I’ve been here long enough to know better by now and decided to open the box. Sure enough, the last 2 were still there.  We reckon Dad thought the box was empty (it didn’t make a noise if you shook it) so binned it.  Needless to say, I hastily shoved them back in the chiller section of the fridge so they could recover!!  You might say this was just desserts for not sharing with them! Well, all I can say is that they were luvvlee – we polished off the last 2 just now (I must be feeling better!).  I know the chocaholics amongst you will understand! J

Lots of love

Jo  x

As Sat mentioned in the last posting, I started teaching at the local village school on Tuesday. I’ve been there every day since then (it’s now Thursday) and think I have enough info to tell you about how life is in a rural Punjabi secondary school.

The school itself is called Government Secondary School Kukran and is located in the centre of the village. It has around 60 pupils ranging in age from 10/11 to around 16/17 and there seems to be an equal split between boys and girls.

The school week runs from Monday to Saturday (!!!) and their day starts with morning assembly at 8am. They march from the school building onto the field in front of the school in single file and stand in rows of about 8-10 pupils, boys on one side, girls on the other. The headmistress leads the assembly and asks the pupils to say prayers. This is followed by a brief rendition of the Indian national anthem.

The headmistress is definitely someone on my wavelength (probably one of the reasons why I’m there). She values healthy living, eating well, taking exercise and helping others to learn whilst still developing themselves. She’s a very determined woman. She needs to be as the conditions of the school coupled with the funding it gets leave a lot to be desired. Anyway, in her bid to get the kids physical strength enhanced she’s introduced some gentle stretching exercises. So after prayers and singing, the kids run through these whilst one pupil stands at the front beating a large drum which dictates the pace of the stretches. It’s quite fascinating. The odd pupil will get a clip behind the ear (usually a boy!) if they don’t follow the exercise pattern! Not sure they’d get away with that in the UK.

Stretching over, the daily newspaper is brought out and either the headmistress or one of the more senior pupils reads out some of the main news headlines of the day. Personally, I think this is a great idea as many don’t have access to news sources so it’s good to let them know what’s going on in the world.

So they’ve prayed, sung, stretched and had a news update. Time to hit the classroom. The beat of the drum gets them back into their respective classes – class 6 through to class 12 (I think!). At the moment I have responsibility for teaching classes 6, 7 & 8 but I was told today that the older kids are demanding my time too. Oh to be popular!

Anyway, classrooms are pretty small and vary in size from about a dozen to 20+ pupils. Their level of understanding seems quite basic but they are enthusiastic and very willing to learn although their shyness tends to hold them back from speaking aloud (although they’re very good at twittering amongst themselves if I happen to leave the room!). I know the older ones understand more than they let on. Classes start at 8.15 (ish) and each one lasts 40 minutes. Fortunately I’ve been given classes in the morning (when it’s a “little” cooler) so my timetable from Monday to Saturday is Class 6 at 8.15-8.55 (period 1), Class 7 (period 2) from 8.55-9.35 and Class 8 (period 3) from 9.35 to 10.15. Next week I have another class to add to this which is after lunch (lunch break/recess is 11.35-12.00) from 12.40-1.20 (period 7). I expect I’ll do some teaching to fill in the time between period 3 and 7!

Given Sandhu Farm is about 3 km away from school I have the privilege of being chauffeured to school either by Mum (that’s Sat’s mum but everyone calls her Mum) or Sat (as was the case today). I don’t much like driving in the UK but I have no intention of driving in India (see previous postings!)

Right, so what about the teaching? I hear you ask. Well, it’s been an experience so far and to my relief (and perhaps surprise) I’m loving it! The kids are receptive and keen to learn. The benefits of my being there are two-fold. They get a native English speaker to help them speak/understand/write better English, and in order to do that, I have to improve my Punjabi in order to say the little phrases which they don’t understand in English. Simple things like, “write it down”, “listen”, “does that make sense?”, “put your hand up if you know the answer”, “speak more slowly” (they like to race through the alphabet thinking it’s a speed speaking competition rather than a pronunciation exercise!). Each night I plagued the rest of the Sandhu clan for these phrases and scribble the phonetic sounds in my little notebook which I now guard with my life!

So everyone’s language skills are improving. I’ll admit it’s been a bit difficult to gauge the level they’re at but in all 3 classes today I did more or less the same thing – “a is for apple, b is for banana, etc, etc”. Gut instinct said this be a good place to start.

I’d spent my run this morning mentally preparing a list of words to correspond to each letter (just in case). But I was keen to continue a more “coachlike” approach to their learning and I was really chuffed that it paid off. Once each class got the gist of what I was trying to teach them, they all came up with their own version of “the list”. Admittedly, many of the words were the same as the ones I had written but it was the fact they understood and took the initiative themselves and it was fun for them and for me. Mission accomplished and each class left with a smile on their face. (I hope that’s because they enjoyed it rather than relief that it was over!) So….a satisfactory start to my teaching career!

There’s yet another bonus to teaching out here, holidays! Not only are there the standard Indian national holidays, but due to the diversity in religions, all Hindu, Sikh and Muslim holidays are also honoured. Monday this week was a holiday and so is tomorrow. Happy days! June is when the school is closed for the whole month as it’s too hot (although it was 40c in the shade today) and the ceiling fans in the school weren’t working yesterday and for some of this morning (they kicked in about 10 minutes before I left – bliss!). One of the joys of an erratic electricity supply. Dad tells me it gets worse as it gets hotter – and we’re experiencing this already.

So, there you have it. My first posting on our latest adventure. My main goal for taking this time out to travel was to use my coaching experience to support and develop other people and also develop myself through being more compassionate, patient and understanding. It’s early days but there’s definitely a tick in the box for life satisfaction at the moment and for now, that’s good enough for me.

Love & hugs

Jo

x

We’ve been in India for almost two weeks now and I’m happy to report that it’s beginning to feel like home. The first week was hard, mainly because of the heat but also because the environment that we now live in took some getting used to.

In terms of the heat, in the shade it’s getting up as high as 37C and in the sun it’s way up into the high 40s! The problem has been that although the evenings are much cooler (at the moment – this is only spring after all) the buildings here are made of bricks, cement and concrete, all of which absorb the heat during the day and release it at night; the stone floors feel like underfloor heating all the time. Hence the nights indoors do not get cooler than about 30C – a few days ago we were in the city of Chandigarh and I’m pretty sure it did not go below 38C while we tried to sleep. Even with two fans on and the windows wide open (sod the mosquitoes we were baking) it was just unbearable. Modern living had actually made summer living worse in India. They used to sleep outdoors when it was hot but nowadays people are beginning to sleep indoors (away from the insects) but without the benefit of the cooling night-time breeze.

That’s when we invested in a water cooler – which certainly helped, but then we went a step further and got air-conditioning installed in our bedroom at my parents place. The installation, done by a bunch of cowboys (or should that be Indians) was a farce, but now that it’s all working and sorted sleep is much more comfortable…I even feel too cold sometimes.

My parents have a place in Chandigarh which they hardly use, but it had decent furniture there, so we’ve moved it all to their place in the country (aka Sandhu Farm) which is what we now call home:

SandhuFarm

That moving of furniture was quite a good step mentally as it made us feel as we were physically moving to our new home. We’ve felt far more relaxed since. Maybe the new TV and satellite dish have helped (I think we get to see more Premiership games here than we did back in the UK – and only for £4 a month subscription!!). Oh and I forgot to say, the Xbox 360 works fine too…I played Halo 3 and Left 4 Dead with my brother Satpal (in the UK) last week.

Some interesting bits of wisdom I’ve learned while we’ve been here (aka old wives tales):

1. Do not drink water after eating melon…it gives you a bad belly!
2. Do not drink water after eating cashew nuts….it gives you a cough!
3. Do not walk barefoot in the heat…it gives you Typhoid!!!

I’ve done all three and my belly is fine, I don’t have a cough and I’ve had jabs for Typhoid!!!

There’s a bit of a scary beehive about 50 feet from the house, but the bees seem pretty well behaved, and as the weather gets even hotter they will move on…soon, hopefully.

Buzz Off

At the moment it’s harvest time. There’s some sort of infection affecting a lot of the wheat crop around here which my parents crop seems to have been spared. They reckon the wheat harvest will be about 35% reduced this year but it doesn’t make any difference to the price my father will get for the crop because the price is fixed by central government. The harvesting is still predominantly done manually, roaming workers move from farm to farm and work seven days a week from dawn to dusk, earning 1500 rupees (£20) for every acre harvested. Then a chap with a machine comes along and separates the wheat from the chaff, earning about 12% of the crop. All this in a country where the price of everything is shooting up.

Harvest 1

Harvest 2

Harvest 3

Went to see the final of a village football tournament yesterday. It was enjoyable – I wished I was playing. The standard on display from the 16-18yr olds wasn’t bad – but they just seemed to lack the sense to calm down a bit and pass and play, rather than running around like blue-arse-flies.

Before The Carnage

Carnage

Red Striker In Blue Team!

The white team won, 2-0, and deservedly so.  The blue team kept playing it long to their striker (in red!) who thought he was Maradonna but played like Madonna.  The winner’s trophy wasn’t given to the captain of the team, instead it was awards to some fat middle aged men that accompanied the winning team (aka their managers/coaches). Even my parents, who had funded the tournament, were awarded a trophy. That sort of thing drives me mad. My parents said that they get a trophy because people want to show them respect and gratitude for funding the event. I pointed out that there are 1000s of unpaid volunteers back home (UK) that give up their time to coach or organise sports events for kids and they do not expect or receive anything in return. A simple thank you should be enough. To give them credit my parents agreed that in future they will ask that they not receive a trophy (maybe they are running out of space for their “respect” trophies) and for winning trophies to be awarded to the team captains.

We’re finally getting into a routine. We’re running in the morning, although it’s already above 30C at 7:00am so I think we’ll have to get up even earlier from now on. I guess we’re in training for trekking to Everest Base Camp later in the year but it’s just nice to get running. The locals stare but we do not encounter many when we run. Yesterday it was a motorbike and an ox drawn cart whereas today there was no-one else on the road (they don’t do pavements) and only a couple of people working the fields, not forgetting the herd of wild cows.

Then after the run we have fresh fruit (mangoes, melon, grapes, bananas and apples) for breakfast. Lunch and dinner are Indian food…which is fresh and delicious. I have to stop myself from eating too much as I am trying to lose the weight I’ve gained over Xmas and post-redundancy! I’m spending most of my time working on my book – I’ll post an extract in a future posting to give you a better picture. Jo’s time will be spent teaching at the local village school – where she is currently (it’s her first day!!!). I know she’ll do well and will get a great buzz out of teaching the kids – but she was a little nervous today.

Generally time passes very quickly here, maybe the midday siestas help. We’re hoping that some members of my family come and visit soon as we do miss them, but we’re set-up on Skype and have probably seen them more online that we would have done in person had we still been in London.

I’ve got Jo, my toys and awesome food….and I’m loving the hot weather too. Not sure we’ll ever leave this place.

Do I miss anything? Hell yes….a simple cheese sandwich. Fresh wholemeal bread and mature cheddar….nice and simple. Wonder if Waitrose/Ocado will deliver here!!!

Anyway – must go, my belly is rumbling.

Laters,

Sat.

“What have we done?”

Those were Jo’s first words last night as we settled into our new home for the next few months.

We left the UK on Tuesday evening after a frantic few days sorting out last minute paperwork, our house rental and cramming in as many culinary delights as we could stomach (excuse the pun!), especially over bank holiday weekend at Satpal and Parm’s home (my brother and his wife).

After arriving in Delhi and getting through customs without any questions from curious officials (we did have rather a lot of techie gear….Xbox 360, laptop, computer bits and audio and video gear!!!) we had a rather long drive to my parents place. It took 10 hours (of which two hours were for breaks). It’s not that my parents live hundred of miles from the nearest airport, it’s because Indian roads are shit! According to a road-sign we saw leaving Delhi, driving in India is as easy as ABC….Always Be Careful – personally I think that’s an understatement.

It took at least two hours to get out of New Delhi…I could write about the reasons but there are so many reasons that the roads in India are gridlocked but I’ll summarise….the drivers here are ALL idiots, no exceptions….yes really. Little things like driving the wrong way on a dual carriageway, or joining a major road without looking to see if it’s clear, or driving without lights at night (made worse by the fact that everyone driving the other way, whether they are on the correct side or not, drive with their full beam on…..sorry, I know I said I wouldn’t go into it but I think my friends (especially those sheltered Americans) needed a clearer definition of what I mean when I say the drivers here are idiots.

We stopped for lunch at a roadside restaurant, which was okay (by Indian standards, i.e. dire by Western standards) but the food was good. We didn’t treat ourselves to parathas but instead went for plain naan bread – did I mention we’re on a diet (especially after the last few weeks of binge eating)?? If you ignore the flies, the scruffy décor, the dirty floors, the dim lighting and the not very effective air-conditioning then the place was nice enough. The 2nd place we stopped at was worse – the kebab dad and I decided to share was like a sponge, in texture and taste (with a few chillies thrown in to hide the taste!). Guess we should have known when we saw their toilets were labelled “He” and “She”!! Although Jo did rate them a 6 out of 10 which is pretty good. At least they were spelt correctly; one day when Indians discover dictionaries they will be so embarrassed at having to change all their “Lay Bye” road signs to “Lay By”!!!

Going back to the road users, the only sensible one we encountered was an elephant – it was keeping in a straight line and wasn’t beeping a horn!

People say that you either love or hate India – personally I think everyone loves AND hates India…the question is whether you find more to love than hate! All the bits I hate tend to be between Delhi and my parents farm….so it’s never an enjoyable drive.

This morning, however, after a good night’s rest, things look much rosier. We woke up leisurely and enjoyed a fruit salad for breakfast and then I spent most of the day getting wireless internet working at my parent’s farm. Then we made sure Skype was fully set-up and working – Jo had a couple of coaching training sessions. We’re now avid fans of Skype now what we’ve discovered new and wonderful features it supports, for example we now have a UK phone number for Jo’s Skype account and we can call landlines in the UK for free using Skype. Not sure we’ll ever revert to using a normal landline ever again!

We’ve had a nice relaxing day…it’s gone very quickly to be honest, which I think is a good sign. Probably do a spot of running early tomorrow (before it gets too hot) and fill up the pool for a spot of chilling (for when it gets too hot). It’s about 33C maximum during the day and it’s only going to get hotter. Thankfully last night wasn’t too bad, we had the fan on full blast and the windows open so that we actually felt cold in the middle of the night – we’ll enjoy it while it lasts! There was apparently a big thunder storm last night, I wouldn’t know because I slept right through it!!

I’ll post some photos soon – once I’ve got the important stuff (like the Xbox) all sorted