Nana in India on Gurney Blog

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A Good Day

Rich told me several days ago that I need to write a positive blog. Well, I had a pretty decent day today, so here's all the positive, fabulous things that happened today:

1. Even though the high temperature today was 114 degrees, we managed to stay cool all day, thanks to car A/C, swimming pools, and generators. We are so blessed.

2. Isaac and I mowed the lawn together this morning. It felt so normal and suburban to do such a thing. And a little physical exercise is always a good thing!

3. Umesh, our handyman, showed up and fixed a bunch of things that were bugging me--a leaky toilet, a screen door that wouldn't stay shut, a broken light, and an outlet that kept frying multiplugs (literally . . . last night it was sizzling). When he shows up, Umesh is the greatest! Perhaps the greatest part about all of this is that I delegated to Sarita the job of calling him, waiting for him, and directing him. She did a superb job arranging it all.

4. I knew we would be gone all day but I had enough foresight to leave instructions with Sarita to make dinner for tomorrow (Sunday). So I don't have to cook and we have enough food I could even invite someone over.

5. Before bed we all knelt in a row on Isaac's bed and Russell volunteered to say the prayer ("because I in the middle!"). He always goes on and on and we can't catch it all, but he is so sincere and reverent. Most of tonight's prayer revolved around Grandma and Grandpa and trains. I think he blessed the food too. But so sweet.

6. Graham tried tofu rolled in wheat germ today and he liked it! He's also been eating graham crackers in the car when we're on the go and he loves them.

7. I hired a driver named Roy Issac today who can start Monday, speaks English, has good references and experience and will work for a reasonable salary! After having major communication and navigation barriers to lumber over today with my current driver, this will be a welcome relief. And he doesn't need a place to live, so that means one less person living here to cause trouble. Hooray! Now I can go explore the city more without worrying about getting hopelessly lost and hopefully start sending the driver out on some of my errands. Blessed again. What a relief. And Isaac is thrilled that we will have a driver named Mr. Issac and we also know Isaac Isaac Pritchett.

8. We went to a birthday party for Isaac's classmate Charlie at the British High Commission Lounge. It wasn't as formal as it sounded on the invitation, our kids didn't make any scenes, and I wasn't too socially awkward and chatted with some interesting people I hadn't met yet--a woman from Peru and some Japanese new mothers, and an American heading off to Moscow or Singapore.

9. Sister Pritchett from our branch invited us to ACSA (the American Embassy club). We had hamburgers, fries, root beer, M&M's, and swam in a wonderfully shaded pool and Isaac got to walk their dog Jaya (he likes dogs now since he's spent some time with her). The Pritchetts have been so good to us. Brother Pritchett wants to go back to the USA to teach economics at Harvard soon, but we're hoping they decide to stay.

10. Rich is in Taiwan on business but we have talked to him several times today. I also talked to Dad in New Zealand. What a blessing our mobile phones and phone networks are! I am happy to hear Mom is also a little better from whatever disease she caught in Delhi and that Dad survived the earthquake that hit Tonga while he was there for work. Blessed again.

So there you have it, Rich . . . a completely positive blog.

Another India Maxim

Okay, this one probably isn't one of those universal maxims that would apply to your life in any way, but it's a lesson we learned anyway:

"If five guys show up one night to hoist a car-sized generator on your roof with a pulley and ask you to buy them dinner, don't just give them the money . . . they might get drunk!"

Yes, it's true. Not only did these guys stay up all night putting the generator on the roof even after we asked them not to. No, it gets better. They were also drunk the whole time! All of this came out when the engineer guy came to collect the money and I started chewing him out because they worked all night. "But Madam," he said, "They had drunk wine before working, so they were strong enough to work the whole night." Say what?!?!? I was pretty in control after that, but I was definitely yelling. Smoke coming out of my head. Servants tiptoeing around me all afternoon after that one.

The clincher is that when I refused to pay the balance we owe until the generator was actually working, the guy couldn't believe I would be so troublesome. Then when I did pay him some money I asked for a bill (receipt) and he couldn't believe that I didn't trust his word enough to go without a receipt this time. Ha. Unbelievable.

Nana Came!

Mom came to India! You can come too. Check out all the fun we had . . . and we didn't even take pictures of half of it.

Nana read lots and lots of stories to the boys while I was stressing about something I can't remember now . . .

Russell and Nana had lots of fun playing. I think by the end of her stay Nana had figured out how to decipher what some of the members think is Chinese (the way Russell speaks). While she was here we convinced Russell to say "wa-Ter" instead of "wa-wa" and "In-Di-a" instead of "ee-a." I had visions of Nana potty-training like Great Grandma Gurney potty-trained Brandon on a visit. But we take what we can get . . .

This is a photo Mom took of us at Khan Market--the upscale place where all the foreigners shop. She didn't believe me that it's upscale until later.

This is a photo of us swinging at the India Gate Children's Park. You can come swing with us there too! We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo . . . You can come too, too, too. Come to India! We promise to do our darndest to keep you from getting as sick as Nana did...

Isaac the Lawn-Wallah

Isaac got a new lawn mower for Easter! Yes, it's just like the one we sold before we moved here. Why buy another one, you ask?

Well, this is our mali-jee (gardener--isn't he just so zen?). We sold the lawn mower because we knew we would have a gardener and figured he would cut the lawn somehow.

Well, it turns out our gardener doesn't cut lawn--it must be a lower caste thing or something. Instead, he asked us to pay extra to have some other guy come in a mow the lawn. When this other guy showed up with a lawn mower like our old one, we decided this was a great chance to keep Isaac remembering what real life is like.

Amazingly enough, once we brought the lawn mower home, everybody wanted a chance to try it out--the guard, the driver, the mali, Mommy, Tom. The same thing happened when we brought the hand wheat grinder out after the electric one burned out . . . but that's another story for another day.

How to Understand an Indian Call Center Rep

One of the many things I dreamed we would do in India is learn how to communicate with those call center reps from India. You know the people I'm talking about. Everyone has talked to one at some point in their life. Our elder's quorum president Vatukuti works at a call center where they call people in Canada to raise money for organ and tissue donation. They tell him to avoid admitting he's in India if at all possible and tell everyone his name is Steven.

Anyway, the only way you'll understand their accents is to come visit us and stay awhile. But understanding what they say isn't always the problem--often it's decoding what they really mean to say. But I think I've finally figured out a maxim to save us all from getting hopelessly frustrated when dealing with those Indian service reps halfway across the world. Here it is:

When dealing with an Indian, listen carefully to the first thing they tell you they will do, for that is where their integrity stands. You may ask them to do it differently and they may agree to do so, but 99.99% of the time they will simply do the first thing they said.

Case in point: Our generator finally arrived yesterday. Hallelujah! Isaac was so excited he couldn't stop talking and refused to go to a playgroup he loves. It came in two trucks. One smaller truck with the generator motor and what I think is the battery and another larger truck with the box it will be enclosed in that will hopefully keep it fairly silent. This thing is huge. Like the size of a small car and probably about as heavy. The trick here and the source of Isaac's excitement is that they planned to hoist the thing on the roof! And not with a large complex machine--a physics teacher's dream--a pulley. We've been talking about it for months since we first started working on this project. And visions of block and tackle have been dancing in Isaac's head nearly every night and day since.

So the generator arrived around 5 pm last night. I doused everyone with bug spray and we headed outside to watch the fun. First they looked around for a bit and then drove the smaller truck onto the lawn in front of the house and everybody left for about an hour, probably to get tea. When they came back and started building their block and tackle contraption Sarita showed up so I had the ability to ask them how long they thought this might take.

Now here's the part where my maxim holds true. The first answer Sarita translated was "all the night." Then I asked, "Will we be able to sleep?" to which he replied, "You will be awake all the night."

Well, here it is 4:00 am and we've been awake nearly all the night. They told the truth . . . initially. But after much discussion that wasn't the plan! After that initial response which I should have just accepted, remembering my little maxim, I called the head honcho and told him I didn't want them working into the night. I didn't think it was safe and I didn't feel like staying up all night and I didn't want to disturb the neighbors. So he talked to these contractors for a bit and then he told me that they would work "maximum three hours" and then complete the work in the morning. Ha. They've been working all night tearing down walls and pulling on pulleys with all their might. I woke up at one point sure there was an earthquake in the house! But we all huddled in our bedroom (for fear the roof might cave in over the boys' room) and we finally got Isaac wound down and the kids at least have slept pretty well. Rich is currently asleep on the floor next to me, so he's doing okay right now too.

So anyway, there you have it. When dealing with an Indian, realize that he isn't a liar. He will always stick to the first thing he says, no matter what he may tell you after that. Maybe I should write a book or start a cross-cultural training business. Or maybe I should just remember my little maxim and stop getting frustrated when it proves itself true once again!

Neemrana with Mama

Nana hanging out at the pool with Graham-Bam.

Isaac on one of the secret passageways at the Neemrana Fort you could spend hours exploring.

Graham hanging out at the movie set of a movie they were filming at this Neemrana Fort we stayed at.

Russell sleeping in the window nook in our interesting room. The fort is from the 14th century so the walls are super thick and all the rooms unique and full of antique furniture. Isaac slept in the window nook on the other side and there was a room for me and Rich up a few stairs from them. Fabulous place to stay with a pool, good food, and tons of atmosphere.

Nana and Graham waiting for dinner together.


Nana on the bumpy camel cart ride. This is her "I hope I don't toss my cookies or fall off this thing!" look.


Rich enjoying the camel cart ride despite the heat.
This is the amazing step well we saw in Neemrana. We climbed down a bazillion steps to peek into this huge rectangle for storing rain water that was built ages ago.

At this stepwell we had two very friendly and helpful tour guides that just showed up out of nowhere. It turns out they were both jewelry sellers trying to court our business at their shops outside the fort.

It worked. Mom had a bracelet made at one guy's shop, I had a ring made, and I bought earrings from the other guy. It's all cheap and Isaac even got to watch the jewelry be made.

These are some of the village kids who gathered around to gawk at the white kid and his dad.

Easter with Mom

The Easter Egg Hunt in the garden with Mr. RK Singh (the guard) helping. A few days ago we found out this guy was taking bribes so we sent him away. But he sure enjoyed this hunt, as you can see.

Notice how sick Nana looks. So sad. Try as she might, she could not get out of bed to go to church this morning, but she did get out later to try to join in the other Easter activities. Poor Nana!

Graham's first Easter was visibly successful. Just give the kid something to sink his two tiny teeth into and he'll give you a winning grin in return!

Isaac's Preschool

This is Isaac's wonderful ECEC4 teacher Mrs. Nath.
Here's Isaac's class with children from Korea, India, Scotland, American, Nepal, Germany, Finland, England, Spain & Israel. Rich says his class looks like a Benetton ad . . .