 Our South India Tour Group We arrived back in London on Sunday, February 24th and are now dealing with jet lag, culture shock and adjusting to winter weather! It won’t take too long before we are back on schedule. We are both feeling more balanced with each day. There wasn’t much time to write anything for the past week so here is a brief overview. We said goodbye to our travel companions on Feburary 19th in Chennai, after lunch at a wonderful vegetarian restaurant. |
 We sampled their Thali plate which featured several small dishes of sauces served with bread, rice and dessert. After a short visit to the local museum, Raman was able to find our guest house and drop us off before finding everyone else’s hotels. |
 On the 20th, we spent the day with our friend Anne Escrader and her family. We had lunch with them and then Anne took us shopping at a couple of local places. We had another opportunity to zip around in an auto rickshaw which really is the best way to go!
|
 Anne took us to a wonderful silk saree shop called Nalli where I thought I had died and gone to silk heaven! The walls were stacked to the ceiling with folded up sarees in spectacular colours, all organized according to price. They sold lovely scarves and off the rack outfits as well. I could have stayed there all day watching the salesmen unfurl yards and yards of fabulous sarees and then fold them up again. |
| February 21st found us at Anne’s again for another lunch prepared by Anne and her helper Angel who produced the best lunch: masala dosa – crispy pancakes made from rice and filled with spicy potato -and chai masala – black tea flavoured cloves, cardamom, ginger, cinnamon and pepper served with hot milk and sugar. I got her recipe for the tea which is easy but the dosa’s are more involved. The tea is extra fragrant because the spices are so fresh. We went to see a Bollywood movie in the afternoon at a local cinema – just like home only with some different snacks! It was in Tamil so we couldn’t understand a word but the plot wasn’t too hard to figure out and everyone else in the audience thought it was hysterical so that was quite fun. |
 Sam’s Villa The next morning we were up early to get a taxi from Sam’s Villa where we were staying to the airport at 4:30 to beat the traffic. It can take up to 2 hours to go 20 kms during the peak hours but it only took us half an hour. The flight stopped in Dubai where we changed planes and wandered around the airport for awhile. The contrast was staggering. Everything in Dubai was super clean, bright and so quiet! Kind of boring! |
 We arrived in Kuwait in the late afternoon and spent the night at the Movenpick Hotel where Wally has been living since October. We were extra appreciative of the hot hot showers, fluffy white towels and lovely white duvet with feather pillows. On the 23rd, Wally went out to the job site to visit with his buddies and I puttered around getting organized at the hotel. We also visited with Wally’s friend Harry and his wife Ning and their little boy Malik who just gets cuter every time we see him. |
| There was some excitement before we left as Wally got an email a few hours before we were set to go that night telling us that our flight to Amsterdam had been cancelled and that we were rerouted on different airlines home – Wally going through Frankfurt, Germany and me going through Washington, DC. Fortunately, Wally was able to navigate the airline phone system and get us on the same plane to Frankfurt with Lufthansa and then to Detroit on Delta. We ended up hiring a car through About-town as we were going to miss the Robert Q we had booked for 1:30 and the next one wasn’t available until after 8:00 p.m.
My first thought on opening the door to our clean, warm, spacious home was – wow, as much as we loved every minute of our adventure, it sure is good to be home! We have been unpacking, sorting out photos and souvenirs, reminiscing about all of the amazing things we saw and did, reconnecting with family and friends and reminding each other that it wasn’t a dream. Emily is away this week in Pennsylvania visiting her boyfriend so it is weird not having her at home. The cats are confused but adjusting well. Thanks to everyone who helped out at home checking in with Emily, cleaning out the driveway, putting food in the fridge (thanks Mom and Dad), covering my yoga classes and for reading the blog. It is such a great privilege to be able to travel in this way, to come home safe and content and to be able to share some of our experiences with our friends and family. Looking forward to connecting with you soon! |