Why I Love Living in India 2.0

We have now lived over two years in Delhi (not counting the 2-3 months per year that we flee it). We recently decided to stay until spring of 2010, and then we're out of here to Who-Knows-What-and-Where. Are we crazy?

Some days two more years in Delhi seems like eons; other days I feel panicked that I've barely wrapped my brain around it or seized all the opportunities to learn and grow. I made a list the first year we were here about what I love about Delhi, partly to talk myself into liking it. I've again been asking myself lately why we are staying in this place that often makes us want to tear our hair out, so it's time to try the list again:

1. I can wear pants to church! If you're Indian, dressing up for church means either wearing a sari (six yards of fabric wrapped around you with a halter-top blouse, unless you can convince a tailor to make it otherwise) or a salwar kameez (a long tunic top with pants that resemble MC Hammer pants from to 80's and a long scarf called a dupatta draped around your neck). I've recently gotten into wearing the salwar kameez gig, and it's fantastic! I can sit on the floor with kids without any worries about exposing myself, those Hammer pants are fantastically comfortable, and if I need to wipe up any kid emergencies, I've always got my dupatta handy. Add to that the delight and amusement of the members seeing me dressed like a native, and it's a win-win situation (this picture isn't me, by the way!).

And it's not just the pants. The flavor of Church is different here too. Since the Gospel is relatively new and there's a scarcity of people, resources, and time, we've learned what the essential elements of Church are. And we've gotten better about letting everything else go--no complicated visuals or handouts, choosing to do seminary but not mutual in our little branch, learning to accept that a hastily-prepared talk or lesson is okay when coupled with inspiration. Those are some lessons I really needed to learn.


2. Our new driver Anil. Having a driver seems like a grand idea, but it took us 11 tries to find someone that doesn't frustrate us more than help us (read more details than you ever wanted to know about the old drivers here). But now that we've finally found one we like, you can't beat the convenience of having someone to drive you around while you read stories to your kids in the back, to park you car, to clean your car, to pick up the dry cleaning, to take kids home after a youth activity so you can get home to your own kids, etc.

3. The Food. I love Indian food. Yummy. I love the fresh roti (flat breads), the raitha (yogurt relish), the curries (love that spicy tingly flavor on my lips), the paneer (fresh tofu-like cheese), the fresh lime sodas (sweet and salty is such a sensory delight), mangoes, lychee fruit, okra from our garden. Hungry yet? I love it that Rich and I can walk to the New Friends Community Centre on date night and choose from a dozen or more amazing and affordable restaurants with ambience--Thai, Chinese, Japanese, Italian, North Indian, South Indian, and McDonalds, Pizza Hut, and Dominoes if we miss America!

4. Our Garden and the Mali (Gardener).
Isn't this guy so Zen? In addition to the good karma I think his countenance brings our household, I love having a gardener that only costs $20/month and enjoying the fruits of a garden that I didn't have to slave over (or fail over, which was as was often the case in Texas with babies). Our grapefruit tree produced about 70 grapefruits this year, which turned out to be the Pulsipher adults' and kids' favorite daily breakfast habit. Delicious!

In the spring/summer we get to watch the wonder of our two banana trees producing bananas. First it's a huge purple bud (which in the South, they pull off and eat) which soon opens up to reveal little flowers that eventually turn into bananas. Amazing. Then the whole giant tree falls down and grows up again that tall in a year. Now our grapefruit tree has yummy fragrant blossoms and all over town there are these gorgeous orangey-red blossoms on a tree whose name I hope to learn (anyone know its name??). I also love to go down the street and buy a bunch of flowers for next to nothing and brighten up my house with their color and smell.

5. Margaret and Poojah.
These wonderful women help keep us sane and alive. Some days it's a real drag having Margaret and her daughter Poojah around ALL THE TIME, often just sitting in the kitchen, but really it's so nice to have someone else do most of the cleaning and cooking so I can focus on other stuff. And when the kids don't like the dinner that Margaret has made, at least I'm not the one who has slaved over something nobody wants to eat! I don't miss the cleaning AT ALL, but I do miss cooking lately, so I'm starting to do a bit more. Still you can't beat the consistency of dinner on the table every weeknight, even if you decide to spend the afternoon at the pool and come home hungry. I also love having Margaret babysit our kids every Friday night so we can go on a date even if we forgot to plan ahead and call a babysitter.


6. The People.
I meet so many interesting people from all over the world and all over India every day. Recently I spent a few hours with a friend of mine Serena, who is from Thailand but has a British mother and an Indian father. It was fascinating to hear her life story, to visit her home and see all her Buddhist religious shrines all over her house and taste and smell her yummy Thai food. I've met and formed friendships with people here from Australia, Korea, Romania, Holland, England, Finland, Japan, Spain, Germany, Israel, Scotland, New Zealand, Italy, Greece, Denmark, Canada, Egypt, etc. And so many have such interesting jobs with aid organizations or government jobs or media organizations. The downside of this international crowd is the transiency. The other day I looked through my contacts on my cell phone and discovered that about half of the contacts no longer live in India (and I've only had my phone for a year!). But I think the fact that we all know most of us aren't here for long, and the fact that many of us are in crisis mode, makes us become better friends faster. Hopefully that means I'll keep in touch with some of these friends long after we've all moved on. Above (center) is my good friend Lesley from Scotland who recently moved with her family (including Isaac's good friend Kara) to France. We miss them!


7. Musikgarten is a Hit!
A few years before we moved here I shifted from teaching piano lessons to teaching group music and movement classes to preschoolers. I was really excited about the curriculum I was learning to use, but I had a really hard time getting enough students to get my studio off the ground. Here in Delhi there is a shortage of such extracurricular activities for small children especially, and the word-of-mouth network is amazingly powerful, so I have no trouble getting students. In fact, my only problem is turning them away so I don't get too busy doing it. I now have 5 classes I teach on Wednesdays with a total of 30 students I teach in my home (so we still have no living room furniture). I really love teaching my own kids along with their classmates in three of those classes (though it's not always easy). I also love the opportunity it gives me to have in my home every week interesting people from all over the world I wouldn't meet otherwise and give them something that enriches their family's lives.


8. Church Makes Us Stretch.

Being a member of the Church in India has been wonderful for us. It has tested, and thereby strengthened, our testimonies. It has given us a crash course in so many callings and leadership experiences that we may not have had otherwise. It has taught us how to do the best we can with what we have, and not get stressed stress over mediocrity and simplicity. I'm now teaching Seminary (sort of like a Bible study class) to the youth/young adults and find it so rewarding and inspiring to teach the Gospel to new converts and potential converts and see it through their eyes. It's refreshing to teach a group so thirsty for truth. I am also the secretary of the Young Women's organization, and am learning to not get too upset when no other leaders show up and I have to wing it. I help in Primary unofficially off and on, and have really gained a testimony of how simply teaching the Primary music pretty much gets the whole Gospel message across, even to children who barely speak English.

Rich has learned buckets and loads of stuff through being a branch president, and I marvel at his stamina, diplomacy, and leadership as he fills this calling. And now some inspiring reflections from Rich on this topic:

I was feeling quite discouraged in my calling and about staying in India one Sunday when I heard a talk by President Taylor in District Conference. He started talking about pioneers, and having heard a thousand people come in and tell the local members what great pioneers they are before, I was expecting more of the same. But instead he chose to talk to us foreigners, saying "I honor you from overseas who have left your friends and your families and the comforts of home and have followed the Spirit of the Lord to be here. You are pioneers." It was always the local members who were supposed to be the pioneers, but it had never occurred to me before that we too could qualify for such distinction. It made me feel ready for another two years.

9. The Travel & Extended Family Time.
One of the cool bonuses of moving overseas with a big corporation is that they provide an allowance for us to travel home once a year. Because we live in a hardship country, we are also required to leave the country for a rest and relaxation trip for at least a week once a year, and that is mostly paid for. It's really nice to have a dedicated time each year when we just go home to America to spend good quality time with all of our loved ones (and stock up on peanut butter and children's medicines). We feel so blessed to have visited Mom and Dad Gurney twice in New Zealand--and this last time to have Brandon meet us there during our visit was blissfully happy. We've discovered that on our big trips halfway around the world that it helps with jet lag to stop somewhere in the middle and run around site-seeing for a few days. This ends up not increasing the airline ticket much, and we've loved our short trips to Copenhagen, Rome, and Bangkok. Add to that the weekend trips we can take in this amazing country, and we really count ourselves pretty blessed to live halfway around the world from our families.

10. Quiet Havens--Lodi Gardens, Tuglaqabad & Our Home (okay, not quiet, but a haven). Delhi is loud, dusty and smelly; but to know the sweet, you must taste the bitter. Once Rich and I were walking in a fairly residential area around 9 pm. He suggested we count how many seconds before we heard a horn honking (mind you, supposedly you aren't supposed to honk your horn in residential areas at night but instead use your lights to communicate). The highest we got in our counting was 6 seconds. On any given day, if you're paying attention, you will probably witness 5 men urinating on the side of the road nonchalantly. I find dust inside even tupperware containers at my house, stepping in cow manure is a common occurence, and if you get a cold it becomes your constant companion for a few weeks because the pollution is so bad.

Because of the oppressive nature of all of this, we keenly feel the contrast when we enter the havens of Lodi Gardens, Tughlaqabad, and our home. Lodi Gardens is a huge park with 4 tombs from the 16th century that Lady Willingdon decided to landscape into a beautiful garden when the Brits occupied Delhi. There are beautiful plants and trees, birds galore, and smooth sidewalks the kids can zoom along on their bikes and scooters. The tombs are gorgeous and though the park is often crowded with people, everybody is calm and happy there. And you can't hear horns honking or smell or see any garbage. Lovely.

Tughlaqabad is a huge abandoned city from the 12th century with enough greenery and hills and stone steps to climb that I can almost imagine that I am hiking in Zion National Park, my favorite childhood family vacation spot. It's one of the few places in Delhi where I feel a measure of solitude.

And lastly, I am so grateful for the haven that is our home. Thanks to the guard at the gate, the high walls that surround it, and the massive amounts of money Rich's company spent to ship our things here and buy us power backup and modern appliances, we can escape the sensory overload and confusion of Delhi in our comfortable home and take a deep breath before venturing out again.

11. Free Home Delivery.
Nearly everything from grocery stores to furniture shops to tailors to McDonald's make house calls and can deliver whatever you like right to your doorstep free of charge. Gotta love that. Especially if you can communicate your order successfully over the phone and get it delivered at the time it was promised!


12. The American Embassy School.
Among international schools, this one is rumored to be one of the best. We love it. There is such a nice sense of community there, the teachers are great, the facilities perfect. The population is diverse and you can't beat ice cream cones at lunch everyday! The picture above is Isaac's assistant KG teacher Ms. Jain with some of his classmates, including one of Isaac's best friends Alina, from Russia.

13. Pulsiphers!
If we did not live in India, we would not have the unique opportunity to host David and Dawn Pulsipher and their six kids for five months. Nor would we have had the chance to entertain other relatives who would not likely have come without the draw of David and Dawn & Co.--Aunt Nancy, Becca & Nathan, the Harmers, Dawn's sister and her nephew. David and Dawn have always been some of our favorite and most-admired cousins, so we were thrilled that Delhi is difficult enough to navigate and housing so expensive that we could have the honor of sharing our house with them.

It is delightful to share our Indian world and discuss it with these very academic, reflective, and Christlike relatives (and we're not just talking about the adults--Andrew, Elizabeth, Jonathan, Michael and Grace are fun to share reactions with as well). While they've been here the count on our little Mormon Utopia Compound has been 24! Definitely a full house. Our children have formed lasting friendships with all of them, and we will forevermore think of the Pulsiphers more like siblings than cousins.

Before they came, I felt in a funk of sorts (no pun intended, though the feeling is characteristically "Funky")--not sure of my place and purpose in India, yet terrified to think about going home to America where there's so many unknowns. Their arrival came at a perfect time, and having them in our home has made me feel more connected to America and family than I've felt in a while. There's nothing like hot breakfasts and real syrup every morning, and scene-by-scene re-creations of Star Wars movies to get us back in touch with our homeland! I'm not sure if we would have decided to stay if we had not enjoyed this grounding visit from our cousins--for better or for worse! Dawn especially has been such a great friend and example to me. She has been endlessly tolerant of my chaotic life and mind and so gently taught me so many things about leadership, motherhood, homemaking, routine and tact. I'm dreading their departure in two weeks, but we plan to visit them in Rexburg soon!

14. Never a Dull Day. Nearly every day yields an interesting story, even if being the main character in the story was horribly frustrating or confusing or maddening! And lucky you, you get to read the stories and see from afar how the Cutler characters are faring in this weird world.

I just re-read my list from 2006, and it's pretty much the same, just more fleshed-out now (and long-winded). It's good to remind myself why living here is a good idea for the moment. Thanks for reading if you got this far. Now book your ticket to come visit this fall/winter to give us another boost when we'll surely need it. Frequent flyer miles are available for your use if you promise to bring us peanut butter and chocolate chips!

Pull Your Ears and Squat

While Merinda is out having fun on the beach in New Zealand, it is now up to me and me alone to hold down the fort and tell the things that need to be told.

This morning our night guard knocked on the door. He held his earlobes with his fingers and squatted up and down three times while pleading in broken English, "Sorry sir, sorry. Very very sorry." He then put his hands flat together in a praying motion, bowed, looked at me right in the eyes and said, "Please sir, please...."

I fired him anyway.

So speaking about holding the fort, our house is kind of a little fort. There is a wall with spikes on the top that surrounds our small front yard, a driveway, the garage with the servant's quarters on the top and the main house. Sitting in a chair outside through the freezing cold and burning sun 24 hours a day is a day guard and a night guard.

The guard's duties are the following:

• Open the front gate when anybody leaves. Much of the time they will salute as the car goes by.

• Open the gate when anybody comes. The car will approach the gate and honk. We will hear the pitter-patter of footsteps running if he is far away, the bolt will slide open, and there he is. Since there are cars honking all the time, he has to know the particular honk of our car or he will wear himself out.
  

• Turn on and off the water pumps early in the morning when there is water to be extracted from the city water supply. Since the water only runs a few hours a day and there is no water pressure, it has to be pulled from the system into a big tank under the house in the early morning hours and then a second pump pulls it from there to a smaller tank on the top of the house. The tank used to be black, ensuring that there was nothing but steaming hot water in the summer until we finally paid Margaret the cook's husband to go up there and paint it white.
  

• Turn on and off the generator when the power goes out. He has had to do this manually ever since the automatic switch broke.

• Raise the alarm if there is ever an emergency. Since he has no radio or mobile or access to a telephone of any kind what this means is that he would blow his whistle. We don't know what would happen after that, but I bet it would be interesting. There's a whistle thing here I've never been able to quite figure out. What I do know is that all night long there is a guy riding around the neighborhood on a bike blowing a whistle loudly at regular intervals. My guess is that there is another guy listening and if he doesn't hear the whistle when expected then he would assume his buddy has been captured, and then, I don't know, maybe he blows his whistle, but in a different way that causes all the other guards join in blowing their whistles: louder and louder they would blow, more and more joining the fun, until the bad guys can't stand the noise anymore and run away.

• An unofficial duty is to play with the kids while they are outside. While Graham was learning to walk the guard would follow behind him squatting down with arms outstreached so he never would hit the ground. They kick the ball with them, go get it when it goes over the fence.

They can do other things too. We used to have them grind wheat back before the hand grinder broke. A friend of Merinda's taught her guards how to knit and they sit and knit sweaters for needy people. They won't sweep or clean, that's a caste notch or two down from where they are, but they do watch the sweeper do her thing.

4:30 yesterday morning, the phone rang. It was American Airlines delivering my lost suitcase. They were at the door, but couldn't get in. Somewhat annoyed at the timing, but happy to get it back, I came downstairs wondering why the guard hadn't let me know he was there. There was no guard to be found. I checked around the front, in the servant's bathroom, back where the water pump is, and he was nowhere.

Finally I opened the closed garage door and there on the ground the guard had made a bed. He was fully under the blankets. I stood there right above this, he blissfully unaware of my being there, while I thought about what to do. We've caught guards sleeping before in their chairs next to the gate, but making a bed was going a bit too far.

So I ripped off the blanket from him and shouted, "Hey, wake up and open the gate!!". He quickly stood up and then stared blankly into my eyes for a few seconds while his brain started up, and then sprung into action and ran for the front.

It turns out that pulling your ears while squating up and down is something that teachers make kids do if they've been bad in class. (They also make kids squat, hook their arms through their legs and hold their ears. Try it. It's not easy, I just had it a shot at it and fell over and hurt myself.) This is not something adults typically do, but I guess it's all that he could think of to punish himself for his mistake.

But since he had been caught in his garage bed several times before by Margaret the cook, I decided to fire him anyway.

The first person we ever fired was a little toothless old guy from Nepal who would put his hands together and bow low every time he saw us. He came with the house and didn't speak a word of English. When we moved in, we weren't sure what we were supposed to do with him, he was just staying up in the then-empty servant's quarters. We agonized over this for days and we finally asked the landlord's man what he was there for. We found out that he was just some random guy off the street that he brought in to watch over the house while it was empty and that if we could use him that would be great, but if not just to send him out.

"Just send him out?", we thought. What will he do? Where will he sleep? Will he starve?

But we didn't know what else to do and so we gave him some extra money and sent him out. He didn't seem angry. For a long time after that we saw him every day, brewing and selling tea on a little patch of ground just in front of the gate which was probably what he was doing before he stayed at our house. Seeing him somehow helped us feel a little better, like he was still alive and OK, until eventually we didn't see him anymore.

Since then, I've fired lots of people. I fired a driver for peeking at the maid while she was showering. I fired another one for selling fuel out of the gas tank.

I fired the guard in the picture on the right because he was too chummy with the people outside and let a really creepy one into the house once when the sewer backed up.

They say that you learn a lot about yourself from living in India, and you don't always like what you find out.

There are a things that really bother me about the firing of this latest one. One is how easy it was for me to do. Each time I send somebody out, I think less and less of it. But much, much worse is this:

He worked for us for months. Opening the gate, shutting the gate, turning on the water pump, off the water pump, on the generator, off the generator, playing kickball with the kids, fetching the balls from over the fence, day in and day out.

I didn't know what his name was.

I couldn't even tell him by his own name to leave my house.

When I think of why we are staying in India, one reason is that I want to conquer this cynicism, and learn to hurt for these folks again, even if firing them sometimes is the right thing to do. I look at the compassionate gaze in the eyes of our resident cousins, the Pulsiphers, and think about how I used to be like that. People take advantage of that look, but does that matter?

Because I just know that in the next life I will be standing in front of some of these good people. I'll pull my ears, squat, and have to say "Very sorry, very very sorry, please..."

On Population Density

So after much long pleading for visitors, they finally came. Our cousins arrived at the first of November, just in time for Diwali. After a week of settling in, we all decided that staying together would work out just fine and they are settled in for a 5-month stay.

The reaction that we get from most people when we tell them that our cousin and his wife and six children are staying with us for such a long time is typically "Wow," followed by a sympathetic, "So how are you doing?" like one would ask about a family tragedy or illness.

The honest truth is, and we are not just saying this because this is a public forum, is that it's wonderful. The kids have lots of playmates, we get paid in new furniture, the servants feel more useful, and Merinda and I get to hang out all the time with two people whom we have always truly looked up to and admired.



The reason that one might think this sort of thing would be difficult seems to be about population density. I woke up early this morning thinking about this and decided to get out my tape measure.

We have a 4-bedroom house, in which we occupy two bedrooms and our cousins occupy the other two. There is a big dining/living room and a kitchen. On occasion we had a college student named Zach crashing on the couch in the living room (and the ladies have a great story of him walking around in his tight bright green long-johns during Merinda's music class), but we won't count him or the days when other visitors are in town.

The 13 of us live in a house that is 1600 square feet. This works out to 123 square feet per person.

We also have a detached garage and above the garage there are two servants quarters. In one of the quarters, there lives Margaret, the cook, her daughter Pooja, who cleans for us, two other teenagers, Lakshmi and Shiva, and her husband Sunderaj. The other quarters are occupied by the driver, Anil, his wife Ritu, their two small children Anshul and Twinkle, a grandmother, and some other guy I think is a brother. They also frequently have other people staying with them as well, but we won't count them either. As a side note, since everybody, servants and all, have joined the Church, on a typical Sunday, 27% of the attendees are residents of our house.

The 11 of them live in the two quarters that are each 185 square feet, making about 34 square feet per person.

Before the cousins came each of us got about the space of the two servants' quarters, where there are now 11 people staying.

If we were to have the same population density as our servants did in our house, we could sleep 48 people. Needless to say, 13 isn't such a big deal at all.

In thinking about this and talking to our cousins, several thoughts come to mind. The way our servants are crowded into those quarters (which they seemed happy to have) is unfortunately not too far off from the way a lot of other people live here, especially in the cities, so it makes us grateful for the 123 square feet we each have.

It is also pretty sobering to think about the way we live and the shame it is that we really physically distance ourselves from each other in our standard way of living. Driving around lots of neighborhoods back home you see 3000 square foot homes with maybe only 3 or 4 people living inside (1000 square feet per person versus snuggling in with cousins at 123 or living like many good people here do with only 34). Lonely, huh?

Turkey Update!

Just for an update on Merinda's Turkey Article.

The smaller of the two turkeys the meat guy was able to sell for $30. The larger one remained in guy's freezer, unsold, for about a month and a half until Merinda gave up all hope and reclaimed her $60 turkey that is now sitting in our home.

The pictures don't do it justice. I'm not sure it is really a turkey. It looks more like some sort of small vulture to me. I would hate to have seen the "small one".

In spite of being scrawny, lopsided, totally freezer burned and who knows how many times thawed out due to power outages in that month in a half, we just couldn't let the guy throw away something so costly that belongs to us.

So now for a contest. We will solicit ideas for what to do with a possibly-inedible, disgusting, sixty-dollar, frozen turkey.

The winner will get a free massage or spa treatment when you come visit us for next Thanksgiving, when we will be surely eating a water-injected, factory-raised, smuggled-out-of the-embassy Butterball that came from the happy shores of the United States of the America.

Turkey Talk

Surreal. That's how life feels today. I guess it should since I live halfway around the world from what I'm hard-wired to think is reality. And I think having the Pulsiphers here has reminded me of what American life was like, thus making Indian life all the more incongruous.

It started at 2:00 am when my cell phone (which happened to be next to my ear since I talked to Rich in Bangalore before I fell asleep) rang. It said "private number" on the caller ID, so I thought it must be some emergency from the USA or Mom in Australia. But it was my Grandma Funk in Utah who meant to call her son in California but hit the wrong speed dial button. Oops. After I chatted with her groggily about how fun it is to have the Pulsiphers staying with us, she asked, "Where is everybody?" "Oh, they're all asleep, Grandma. It's the middle of the night."

Luckily I did go back to sleep after Grandma's little surprise (always great to hear from her and partake of her rose-colored view of all things, even at odd hours!). But I still was up early, and quickly remembered that I needed to fix the washer hose I had broken last night. This was a relative emergency because while washing Graham's cloth diapers last night the washer had stopped when it got to the rinse cycle because there wasn't enough water. Because we live in India, we don't have the blessed luxury of constantly running tap water. We do have various mechanisms and people to try to remedy this, but they don't always work as planned. Anyway, before I went to bed I pried the hose off the tap to confirm that indeed there was no water. Made a mental note to put it back on in the morning and wake up the guard to tell him to turn on the water pump so I could get the diapers in the washer rinsed and dried before we ran out. Why, you ask, was I worrying about washing and drying Graham's diapers when I pay two people to occupy my kitchen all day and do housework? I ask myself the same question quite often. Part of the answer to the question is that you get what you pay for (though they are very well paid by local standards). The rest of the answers are partly my poor management skills and partly incomprehensible.

So I spent the better part of my early morning with a screwdriver trying to figure out how to get the hose back on. I kept reasoning aloud (with Michael Pulsipher as my sounding board, who was working on his homeschool homework) that if I could pull it off, I could certainly put it back on. But my brain needs more practice with fix-it work, so it took me a while. I was quite proud of myself, however, when we finally figured it out (by the time I did Isaac was awake and helped me finish it off).

Then David graciously took Isaac to school so he could use the car afterwards. Graham and I read some stories under the stairs and I tried to make a plan for the day. Dawn and I decided to set off with our little ones to Sarojini Nagar to fill the urgent need Isaac has for pants now that the weather has turned "cold" and mosquito-y. So we piled Russell, Graham, Michael, Grace, Katherine, Dawn, Anil (our driver), 6 sliced carrots for Isaac's Thanksgiving feast at school, 7 library books, lots of snacks, diapers and water, and me in the car and made it to Sarojini just after opening time at 11:00. We did amazingly well with our 5 kids in this crazy market full of cheap export clothing. Dawn got a skirt for Elizabeth and a bright pink Indian-looking cotton shirt with sequins and a beautiful gold crepe paisley-printed sari for herself. Russell talked me into a $5 Superman sweatsuit he didn't need. Anil followed us around and tsk-ed at the prices we were paying. But we think $2.50 for a shirt is pretty good! We took a break to take Russell to school by 12:30 and then hit it again. I found four pairs of pants for Isaac, which thankfully turned out to be just what he wanted. $5 each with adjustable waists, some with camouflage accents and zip-off shorts, which he thinks is sooo cool. He plans to use the camouflage to help him hide from his friends at recess.

Success on that count. But when we got home our good bargains quickly dissolved from my memory when I heard the news about the turkeys. Oh, the turkeys. Rich and David will be at home alone this Thanksgiving while Dawn and I take the kids to the Pushkar Camel Fair in Rajahsthan. But this year we're going for a bachelor Thanksgiving party with 10 LDS missionaries joining them for their feast. So we felt like these poor homesick boys needed a turkey. I scoped out the prices of what I could get them for through friend at the American Embassy ($1.60/lb), and decided they might come cheaper locally. So I asked Margaret to look for one during her weekly trip to her favorite food market INA where "everybody knows her name" as they say on Cheers, since she's been a faithful customer for 16 years. But I neglected to give her a price point. And gave her all of this week's food budget for the 13 of us. Big mistake.

So she came home with two turkeys--a male and female with the feet still on. I think she watched them slaughtered herself. Lovely little things totaling 5 kg (about 12 lbs.). But the price . . . not so lovely. $90. NINETY DOLLARS!! For two scrawny little birds. When I asked Margaret why she would pay Rs. 3600 (half the weekly food budget) for them without consulting me, she looked at me blankly, as if to say, "Why wouldn't you spend $90 on a turkey? You throw your money around like water on everything else." Surreal. Last time I checked I'm a miser. But in India, wealth is all relative.

I was incensed by all of this, probably way more than I should have been. But to me it highlights the irony of the fact that I have hired domestic servants to help me around the house and they often cause more stress and more work and more expense than their work is worth. I cannot kick the American way of life and get annoyed when the people who work for me don't act like washing machines, dishwashers, minivans, running water, garbage trucks or security systems.

So anyway, we called the turkey shop and asked the man if we could return the birds. He said he would try to sell them, and then give us the money if he does. Cross your fingers for us! What would you buy? The bird in the refrigerator, or the one you could look in the eye and make friends with before its slaughter? I'm afraid most everyone will choose the latter.

I'm praying they do sell, because I've already committed to buy a frozen turkey imported from the US from my friend. I haven't picked it up yet, but I'm hoping it's a Butterball one with a pop-up plastic button that tells us when it's done!

After the turkey rage and drama died down (mostly) I headed to the church to teach seminary to my class, which was well-attended today: 1 boy and 6 girls. We talked about how Moses learned to delegate and as I taught the students about how important it is for leaders to share their load and accept help and for us to support and help our leaders, I realized how much the Lord is teaching me as I clumsily get leadership practice at the expense of everyone around me. And as I taught them about Mt. Sinai and how the children of Israel were content to let Moses ascend that holy place and talk with God in their behalf instead of being worthy to enter themselves, I learned other whispered truths spoken to my heart about personal revelation and total trust in the Lord and His plan for me.

On the way home from Seminary we dropped off several girls, one of whom was a girl who is investigating our church named Sonam. It seems that Sonam has never ridden in a car before because it made her so sick that she vomited repeatedly out the window after she and I quickly crawled over and around each other so she could get there. Cars honking, hazy air, giggly girls chatting in an incomprehensible tongue in the backseat, rubbing Sonam's back and she vomits out the window again while we crawl forward in traffic. Surreal. But maybe it's more real and raw than anything I've ever experienced in America, and that's why it still shocks me even after two years. Why it breaks my heart and makes me question everything I thought I understood, or perhaps understand it better.

Stay turned to hear the fate of our poor rejected birds . . .

Pink Pudding

Just wanted to share this great story from our friends up the road, the Smiths.

Poisonwood Bible & Servants

I just finished The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. Beautifully written and gives a good view of expatriate life in general, especially from the child's perspective, something Kingsolver should know about because she was a "third culture kid" herself in Africa. Good writing aside though, for me at this stage in life it just hit too close to home and pegged my life wrong (I hope). It’s all about a Southern Baptist minister and his family who go to the Congo to convert the heathens and how they don’t have a clue about how to survive and how to convert people, if they need to convert them at all. Tragedy hits their family and they get all tangled up in the imperialistic (money-grubbing) "help" from the United Nations after the Congo declared independence from Belgium. In the end I had this horrible taste in my mouth about being an expatriate and working to help the Church grow here. Her critique of Americans who presume the whole world wants to be just like them is scathing, to say the least.

I guess it was good for me to read because it reminded me that I have to be really careful not to pass hasty judgments on people and culture here since so much of it is much more complex that it appears on first glance. Rich said the other day that the longer he lives in India the less he feels like he understands. So true.
So we passed our one year anniversary living in India AWAY from India! We felt like such wimps. But we went to New Zealand to visit my parents for Christmas. It was heavenly. Almost an exact foil to Delhi. Clean air, quiet, long stretches of roads without a soul in sight, etc. So wonderful to be with my parents and have a break. It’s good to be back though and face the music, which is good music most of the time.

It’s really really cold right now. Such a nice break from the blazing heat that’s coming soon. I love to cozy up in my fleece pajamas and drink hot cocoa in bed with piles of blankets on me. Someday I plan to live in a climate with four seasons again! Rich is headed to the US tomorrow for a big meeting with his boss and he needs to tell him if he wants to stay here longer or not. I’m back and forth on the matter and almost wish we didn’t have a choice and they just made us stay so we could buck up and just do it. Anyway, hoping to get some inspiration on the matter quickly.

I just sent an email to a friend who is moving here and trying to work out the logistics of who to hire for her "staff". When you figure it, we employ 5 full-time people and 2 part-time. We have our own health insurance plan for them, terms of employment, etc.. Figuring that for every person you give a job to in India, you are feeding 5, that's around 30 people we're taking care of. Some days it seems that most of them are at our house, although really there's only about 9 or 10 who actually are here at the house at any given time (that's not counting us).

So anyway, when I reread the email it seemed worthy of posting because our lives are so bizarre . . .

Our car costs us Rs. 45000 for the month. Driver comes with the car. We provide the driver quarters because we have them, but the owner has a sort of bunkhouse in Gurgaon for his drivers if we didn’t. I think he gets paid Rs. 5000 of that lease amount, but I’m on the lookout for a fantastic one to replace him and I’m willing to pay for it. Maintenance is cheap, diesel isn’t. If we leave the Delhi/Gurgaon/Noida area he charges us Rs. 10 per kilometer (22 cents). The car is a Toyota Innova, 8 seater (though definitely smaller than the equivalent USA Toyota minivan).

Mali (gardener): Rs. 800 to come every day for an hour to water, weed, sweep the area in front of the house.

Sweeper: Rs. 550 to sweep the driveway and wash it with water every other day. On the off days she cleans the bathroom the driver and guards use. I added the bathroom to her duties a few months ago with a pay raise when I realized everyone considers it beneath them to do this job and it seemed worth it because the users of it handle my children!

Guards: The company pays for their salary (an exorbitant amount I can’t recall at the moment, of which the guards only see a small fraction) but we give them Rs. 400 per month for tea! I know it sounds ludicrous that we pay this, but there’s a long history behind it. They were perpetually coming and asking for more tea, more sugar, etc. and then getting into fights because so-and-so was drinking more than his fair share. So I got fed up with it and this money is a sort of bribe, I guess, to leave me alone already about the tea! We also pay Rs. 150 per month for their newspapers. Tomorrow I’m about to go out and buy them a new heater because the old one isn’t enough for them. Pampered, I’d say.

This photo is the guard, driver, and a bicycle rickshaw driver we hired for the day all watching the sweeper work. They often seem bent on highlighting the fact that her job is beneath theirs. In case you wondered why we need so much staff, here's a case in point. India's all about division of labor. Rich always says the sweeper and the mali are the happiest people he knows, so I guess happiness is independent of caste anyway.

Cook/Ayah: Rs. 5500. She also gets quarters. She is my highest paid employee yet. She was making a lot more at her old job though, and I think she’s worth it most days because her English is impeccable, she is honest, she’s pleasant, and she doesn’t pick fights with the other staff. She’s also a pretty good cook and adores our children without pampering them too much. All of this I didn’t really know about her when I hired her. Best to start low and give merit increases, I would say.

Housekeeper: Rs. 3500. She works part-time and this is her first job (she’s Margaret’s daughter, so shares the quarters). I plan in the next few months to try to get her to REALLY clean the house well and if she succeeds I’ll give her a big raise. She cleans, folds clothes and irons. She helps with the kids here and there as well.

Here's Margaret, Poojah and her whole family of five who live on our little "compound" with us.

As a general rule, I’d say it’s best to hire staff that have enough experience that you don’t have to train them too much and enough English that you can communicate, but be wary of those who have years of experience with expats because they are often spoiled and sneaky. You don’t always get what you pay for. Also, English skills are a big premium, so if you are game for using your Hindi, you can save a bunch by going for those that don’t speak well. My friend Amy has done this and pays her maid Rs. 3000 with no quarters. Rich is reading over my shoulder and says he wouldn’t recommend this.

Oh the things you learn in life that seem so important at the time, but will be worthless when you return to your own reality!

"Garam Masala's" First Birthday

Graham had a fabulous first birthday. Isaac decorated a carrot cake for him with a blue star and Sarita brought over a fruity cake of sorts she'd spent all day making. We put him on the kitchen table with both of them in front of him. Despite Isaac's efforts to take charge of the situation, Graham quickly plunged into both cakes and had them smeared all over himself, the table, and everyone else in no time. He was more interested in playing in it that eating it, though! For his birthday he had a great runny nose and climbed out of his high chair onto the marble floor, falling on his four new top teeth and bleeding all over. We also took him to pick up Dolly and while I was inside her house sampling her South Indian cuisine, Dolly's neighbors made friends with Graham (Rich assures me he didn't let any of them touch our little Garam Masala).





So now we're trying a new model of posting photos that's much faster. Check out lots more photos of Graham's big day(s) here.

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.

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.

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!

Dust

So I'm teaching Sarita how to cook and read recipes. She's getting very good at it. Yesterday I gave her a recipe for Apple Crisp and asked her to make it. When I came home, there was a beautiful apple crisp in a clear glass pan waiting for us. But later when I looked at it again, I noticed a rather thick layer of white on the bottom.

"What's that white stuff on the bottom, Sarita?" I asked.

"Oh, Madam, the recipe said to dust the bottom of the pan with flour. So I did."

Of course. In Delhi dust accumulates at an alarming rate. So why wouldn't she think dusting the bottom of the pan with flour meant putting a thick layer of it down! Gotta love Delhi. Fortunately I'm stepping back and laughing more than raging these days.

Another Day in the Life of Mindy

7:00 pm (night before--to get the full picture we must start here...) I fall asleep on the floor while giving the FHE lesson. I've been totally exhausted fighting whatever disease my body has. I vaguely hear Rich and the kids pop popcorn and go to bed.

1:00 am I wake up and take out my contacts. Can't sleep because I'm still coughing and have been for over a month. I drink some herbal tea and read "A Joyful Mother of Children" by Linda Eyre for a bit. I realize that many of my frustrations are not unique to India and maybe I could get over this cough and feel better about life in general if I got some exercise.

6:00 am I wake up and tell myself I'm going to get up and take a walk. Fall back to sleep

6:45 am Isaac crawls in bed with us (next to Graham who joined us some time in the wee hours). I try to get out of bed and go for a walk without anyone noticing. Isaac asks where I'm going. "For a walk," I say. "Can I come?" I tell him he can if he gets ready in time. He does in lightning speed and we take a short walk.

7:00 am I come home to Russell nearly hyperventilating because he's been crying the whole time we were gone. "I wanted (sniff sniff) to go with Ma-Maaaaa."

7:15 am Russell and I go for a walk. I carry him most of the way. It's already getting hot. We see two dog fights on the way.

7:30 We eat breakfast. Oatmeal.

7:45 I realize I no longer have time for a shower and try to make myself look presentable enough anyway. Can't put my contacts in because one eye is too swollen. Maybe too much sleep?

7:55 Isaac and I go off to school leaving Rich with the sobbing Russell in his arms: "I want to go with Ma-Maaaaa!"

8:30 Drop Isaac off at school

8:40 Sign up Russell and Isaac for Saturday Swim Classes. I put them in the same class, mostly for logistical purposes. It's called Water Exploration, so surely they can both handle it.

9:00-10:00 Hindi Class. I learn how to say "Do Not Disturb" in Hindi: "Disturb nahee carriega." Good to know.

10:00-11:00 Wait for the driver to arrive outside the school on a bench while I worry about the kids at home with Sarita. Feel very guilty that I'm just sitting here while I could be at home taking care of my kids. Wonder if the Hindi class is such a good idea.

11:00-12:00 Go to Marcia's House for a coffee hour. I don't drink the coffee and wait for the kids to arrive with Sarita.

12:00-12:30 The kids arrive. Russell has a poopy diaper that's soaked through because he won't let Sarita change it. I get him all cleaned up and into Isaac's pants (which Sarita had mistakenly brought along). He won't take them off all day, insisting they are his pants as he pulls them up for the thousandth time!).

12:30-1:30 We all go shopping together. Try for the third time to get into a shop called Basix that supposedly sells the only sofa beds in the city. The first time I tried to go it was closed for this strike against the government because they're tearing down buildings that aren't built to code. The second time I tried to go it was closed. On this third attempt today I find that the government had "sealed" the shop so not even the owner can get in! When I call the owner to see if it will open again, he assures me it will be "de-sealed" by tomorrow. We'll see . . . Meantime, Mom's prospect of a bed apart from an air mattress is looking dismal.

1:30-2:15 Go to the doctor to see why I'm still coughing after 1 month and two rounds of antibiotics. I don't realize until I cart the kids in and get checked in that I don't have any rupees to pay for the visit and Rich has my ATM card. I walk away frustrated. I try to change my US dollars at a nearby bank, but they don't do that there, of course. Realize I won't have time to see the doctor anyway once I try another bank, so I give up and go get Isaac.

2:00-2:30 Pick up Isaac at a playdate at a Korean classmate's house. His mom said (in broken English) she wanted Isaac over to help her son practice his English. When I arrive they are watching Harry Potter and eating pizza and there's another Korean classmate there. Isaac looks scared and/or bored. I rush him out of there as fast as I can. Isaac tells me in the car they didn't wear seatbelts on the way home from school. I say, "That's not really safe," and don't really know what else to say. Most Indian cars don't even have seat belts in the back seat. How can I require my kids to wear seat belts if they aren't even there?

2:30-3:00 Drive home. As we get out of the car the guard informs us that the garbage man will no longer pick up our garbage because it's too smelly (from our diapers--I guess we have more of them than most since we don't let our kids poop in the street). I wonder what we'll do if nobody will pick up our garbage . . .

3:00 Find that Sudhir has put two really wet and soapy rugs in the dryer and the whole mess is sloshing around in there. I ask him what this is and he looks at me blankly. I send them off on their lunch break and try to fix the mess. Just after they leave I find a square burned onto the wooden table in the kitchen hiding under a muffin tray. Make a mental note to ask Sarita about that one. This sort of stuff must be what Claudia was talking about when she kept telling me not to let them near anything you couldn't handle being broken or ruined.

3:00-3:30 Isaac lays on the rug at my feet while I feed the baby. "Mom, what does settled mean? Are we settled yet?" Everyone here seems to ask that question: "Are you settled yet?" I think for a minute, then say, "Isaac, I think settled means you feel like this is home. Do you feel that way yet?" "Yes," he says, and runs off to play. I'm so happy to hear he feels settled!

4:00-6:00 Feel too exhausted to face the projects and staff angst at home, so I decide to go to the Australian-New Zealand Mom's Group (they let Americans come as long as they aren't too obnoxious!). There's about 20 kids there, 12 moms, 3 ayahs (nannies). The "bag man" comes to show us all the designer leather bags he can make. I watch nearly all of the moms order a bag while I feed Graham baby food and try to fight fires with the kids. This bag man has funky colors, cool designs, all for $20-30. I think about how I still need to buy a generator and come up with more space for storing clothes and choose curtain fabric before I start thinking about bags. Besides, Rich would kill me if I came home with another bag!

6:00 Come home and make Mac and Cheese for the kids. I'm trying to gorge them on it before it expires in hopes that they'll be so sick of it they won't want it anymore once it's gone! Not sure if it will work. I don't plan on telling them we can get it here for $5 a box!

7:00 Find that Sarita and Sudhir have written angry messages in their time card book because we didn't pay them the way they wanted. Stew about that one while I get the kids ready for bed.

8:00 Sit down and try to figure out what is going on with Sarita and Sudhir and try to work out a workable solution. Graham wakes up and joins me on the floor nearby--he will sit happily forever chewing on a toy and then suddenly switch to the tummy-down position and zoom off in search of something better. His favorite things to head for are electrical outlets, of course!

9:00 Rich comes home and makes me toasted tuna and cheese sandwiches and offers good advice about dealing with Sarita and Sudhir. He lays down on the rug beside me and falls asleep.



I wrote all this down thinking that it would illustrate what a terrible day I had. Once it all came out, it wasn't all that bad. It turns out that I have bronchitis, so perhaps my feeling for the day was colored by the infection and exhaustion a bit. Anyway, it's a good life. In the end, the kids make life so joyful no matter where we live, as long as I step back from the mayhem and recognize it!

"Madam, *#@!$!!"

So the other night while Rich was at a meeting the kids were in bed, all was quiet, and I was chatting online with Nelee. "What's up?" she said. "Not much here," I said. "NuSkin is doing layoffs," she said, "so I better go." About two minutes later, the doorbell rang and I opened it to find the guard saying "Madam, *#@!$! [something in Hindi beyond what I've learned in my 10 classes]." And I (of course, as usual) looked at him blankly, and he, exasperated, motioned for me to follow him. We walked together to the electrical box which just happened to have loads of smoke coming out the top and a fire inside!

I called Umesh, our baby-faced electrician who comes nearly every day these days. I then tried to call Rich, got no answer, so I text messaged the following: "So there's a fire in the electrical box. Umesh is coming in 20 minutes. I may be in NZ by then." For those of you who don't know, NZ is New Zealand, where my Momma happens to live right now. It was one of those moments. Actually though, I was surprisingly calm about the whole thing. It was immediately funny to me unlike other tense moments I've faced in India. This one was just so over the top it was all I could do to laugh! The gravity of the situation became a bit more real when the power went out (which made the fire finally stop!).

I wish I'd taken a picture of the actual fire. I thought of it immediately, but the guard was so upset I thought it might make him more distressed if I ran inside to get my camera. Anyway, when Umesh arrived I started shooting pictures.

This first one shows the blackened wall where the fire was burning.


Umesh the Electrician and Milap the Driver trying to figure out how to get the power back on.


This is how things actually looked without the flash. The power was out after all! Luckily the walls in the house are all made of concrete so the fire stayed contained! I'm currently on a quest to find a fire extinguisher, but it's slow going, as usual. . . After this particular power crisis we lived on minimal power (no water heaters, no microwave, no A/Cs) for two days.

Our Sea Shipment Arrived!

The first thing Russell did was start rummaging through the toys for the trains!

The part of the shipment I was dreading was the year's supply of food and other supplies because I wasn't sure where to put it! I'm still not sure, but we're a few steps away from this chaotic state which was a toddler/preschooler wonderland.

Once the 13 men who unloaded and unpacked our stuff stopped to take a break, Russell put some of them to work building his castle. It's amazing how a few months of household help can turn a 2-year-old into a bossy sahib.

This is all the moving guys trying to push and shove our couch in the door. They know how to provide plenty of manpower, but the brainpower is sometimes seriously lacking!

Russell and Daddy watching the unloading perched on top of the piano. The piano was amazingly in pitch after its long journey by truck, boat, train, and then truck again.

Graham enjoyed most of the day playing on the grass or sleeping in the stroller with Sarita and Sudhir while we tried to direct all the barefooted moving men.

Home Shopping Network (India Style)

The guy with the beard is a man named "Butcher King" who delivers beef right to your home and cuts it right in front of you just how you like it. Eating beef is not common or popular here, so he's quite discreet in his delivery!

This guy is one of many merchants who show up at our gate often selling their wares loaded on the back of bikes or motorcycles. Come to India and you can stop shopping with your remote and bargain at our gate. The guy in the uniform here is Rambir, my favorite guard. He doesn't speak a word of English but he comes running whenever anybody needs help and royally chewed out a "chiseler" the other day who stole 18 rupees (36 cents) from us.