What We've Been up to...in pics

Here are some pictures of what we've been doing while visiting. We've already done alot in a week in a half. We're in Louisiana with my parents right now. Brian made it safely back to Bangalore.

What's Happenin'

I'm trying to figure out how i'm going to upload our pictures on someone else's computer but for now I'll just give a little update...

we've been having fun visiting with family and friends. We got to spend Father's Day with my dad and grandpa, go to a going away party for my cousin's husband who will serve in Iraq, eat at Freebirds and have some friends over for a bbq dinner. The night we were having our friends over, I got back from Wal-Mart around 4:30 (they were coming at 6) and Brian tells me that we have to take Corban to the ER because he had been crying and holding his stomach for 2 hours. He was in major pain. So we got in the car, called our friends to cancel and headed to the ER. On the way Corban went from tears in his eyes to sitting up and laughing in about 10 minutes! He was healed before we got there! We don't know what was going on or what happened but we do know that the Lord took away whatever was hurting him and saved us a lot of money at the ER b/c we don't have health insurance!! Thank you Lord! So Corban is better and hasn't had the pain since then. We called our friends back and asked them to come for dinner again:)

We Made It

Sonic hamburgers, the sound of country music, exhaust-free air...we're in America!:)

The trip was long but thankfully uneventful. Our luggage made it this time and the airport dog didn't sniff any food or drugs in our bag to hold us up:) (last trip, a dog sniffed out the fruit in our bag so we had to go thru an extra security check...i'm the genius that brought fruit from a foreign country:) Kai was a squirmy worm, rightfully so for a 14 month old on a 16 hr flight. He kept me busy. The other 2 boys watched lots of Disney movies and slept.

The new Bangalore airport was awesome! When I say it is 1 million times better than the old one I'm not exaggerating. We could actually find a seat to sit in rather than the floor.

We've had a lot of fun so far with PawPaw and NaNa (my parents) and our family. It worked out great b/c we went to a bbq yesterday afternoon with my family so we were able to see alot of people at one time and be forced to stay up late even though we were exhausted. It helps with the time adjustment if the kids can stay up later. They were still up at 6am this morning, but better than 3:30am like yesterday!

This week we are getting emergency expedited passports so that we can renew our expiring visas. We are praying that everything works out exactly as planned so that Brian can catch his flight on Friday.

It's really great to be here. I'm going to try post pics while we're here.

The Looking Forward List

An Indian friend who has lived in America asked me what I was looking forward to the most about visiting. I told her that besides seeing family and friends they were all superficial things. She said “that’s what I want to know!!” So as long as everyone knows they are superficial I will go ahead and share what we are looking forward to…most involve food:)
Note: it’s funny how we don’t think about these things until we know we’ll be going to the U.S. Then you’re mind starts remembering the way turkey sandwiches taste for lunch:) and grilled mutton (outside Brian’s office) starts to smell like Papacito’s steak fajitas:)

#1 Mexican Food
Brian wants BEEF! (i.e. What-a-burger, steak fajitas)
Shopping at Wal-Mart
Not eating boiled eggs everyday for lunch (mmm...turkey sandwiches:)
Disposable diapers for 6 weeks!!!!!!! A vacation from cleaning dirty cloth diapers:)
Driving in an orderly, stress-free fashion

MEANINGFUL BEST PART OF OUR VISIT:
Hugging all of our family and friends and spending quality time hanging out!!!!!!
Can’t wait to see you all!!

Thanks for your prayers for our travel!!

Mango Madness

It's mango season in India and they are everywhere! Fruit vendors line the streets with perfectly stacked pyramids of mangoes on their carts. At the grocery store you can choose from about 6 varieties averaging around .70 cents for 2 pounds (1 kilogram)!! I remember not buying mangoes in the states b/c they were about $1 each! I was told that Lalbaugh--the botanical gardens that we visited with Melissa--has a mango display containing around 400 varieties of mangoes!! I had no idea there were so many! They are dee-lish!!!

Putting it Into Perspective

I was beginning to dread the journey we have coming up this week...
Since the new airport is much farther from our house (1 hr 45 min with no traffic), we will be spending the night in a cab and the airport (which means not sleeping) to catch our plane that leaves at 4 am Friday morning. We have 24 hours of travel (21 in the air). We have a 14th month old that communicates by screaming and screeching his desires (which is really what i'm dreading:) and to top it off I've heard rumors that airlines are flying at slower speeds due to fuel prices! Maybe you can imagine the bitter sweet thoughts of starting off our journey.

Well, I happened to read my friend's blog late one night this week and saw a post about this precious baby girl Elysha. Her parents, after surgery and a hard fought battle, were having to pull the plug on her breathing tubes that same day and watch their sweet baby go to be with Jesus.

It really puts things into perspective...I bet they would give anything to fly for 22 hours with a screaming baby--probaby 100 hours--just to have her with them.

Thank you Lord for reality checks and please, please help me not to grumble.

Brian's B-day @ Hard Rock Cafe

Hard Rock is our official b-day celebration station (for the adults:). It has the best American food in town and can only be afforded twice a year:) Brian has declared their hamburgers the winner after our city search for the best burger, (side note: our search was completed last weekend when we tried our 5th burger joint, 2 of which should be called "Sloppy Joes" not burgers:) We think we've exhausted our burger resources:)
The dessert was a huge brownie sunday which i remembered to get a shot of this time. We cleaned it up!
We are so thankful to have Brian as a husband and a daddy and grateful he is celebrating another year. He is a special man.

BRAIN's B-day

Today is Brian's b-day! He is joining the "30 Club"! (Finally! I've been there awhile:D)

Brian had two b-day cakes--he and Corban shared one friday night with our friends from church, and we surprised him at work on Saturday with another one. Both times the bakery spelled his name "BRAIN". This is how everyone in India spells his name:D And this is how they pronounce it as well. He had to show his co-workers how to phonetically pronounce his name..."Bry-Un":)Even though I spelled out his name for the bakery they probably thought I had misspelled it and "corrected" it for me:D

Corban's Birthday

Yesterday Corban turned 5! We went to a waterpark/amusement park to celebrate. This park is pretty new and was way nicer than we expected. Corban had a blast! He was very brave and went down the tall slides. He loved the lazy river and wave pool.
We also attended a co-workers wedding reception that evening. For timing issues the reception happened the night before the wedding (which takes place today) and she wanted us to attend the reception. I included some pictures of the dinner served. (I forgot to take pictures of the bride and groom--oops:) It's called a "Meal" and is traditional at most ceremonies/events and available at restaurants. I've posted pictures of it before. It looks gross but tastes good. It's pretty much a "must" to enjoy Indian food living here as far as attending parties/events. If you're not eating they ask why:) I always wait til the tortilla-like bread is served so i can scoop up the food (no silverware or napkins available) and i usually get asked why i'm not eating yet:) Each item on the banana leaf is served by a different person that comes around and puts it on your "plate". The bread is usually served last along with the rice. I'm still trying to figure out the whole napkin thing though. Even at Wonder la--the water park-- they didn't have ANY napkins in the dining area. I guess people just wipe their hands and mouths on their clothes:) They had a sink area to wash hands so i guess that's the alternative. It saves trees:)

Price of Gas and other Disgusting Updates

We have been hearing how high the price of gas is in the states. I think we are in for a rude awakening when we come to visit this month and have to pay over $4 a gallon! Ouch. With so much attention on fuel costs you would have thought this would have dawned on me earlier, but i'm a little slow:) Last week I realized that the price for our fuel hadn't changed since we moved here. We use diesel which is at 36 rupees per liter. This translates into $3.41 per gallon. Gasoline is around 54 rupees per liter...$5.10 a gallon. Ok, I hadn't done the figures until now...that's a lot:) But strange that it doesn't go up or down. Brian said the government sets the price and supplements the losses when fuel costs go above that. Diesel always seems to be less than gas which is a plus for us. But now that i'm looking at these figures it's probably even more expensive to drive here b/c salaries are much less here. Hence compact cars and few SUV's I guess.

On the Pest Control front...you may remember my phobia of cockroaches. I think I've seen about 3 or 4 of those huge babies in our apt since moving here...not bad for 9 months in communial living. Well, I noticed lately that these creatures have been hanging out at the back door just waiting for it to open so they can run in. I asked myself, "Are roaches really this smart that they know it's a door and they are standing guard to make a run for it when it opens?" The answer is yes and they are even smarter than that. Brian discovered (after I screamed that 3 were at the door!) that they had made a home under our kitchen cabinets (cabinets here are not built-in so there is aabout a 5 inch gap b/w them and the floor and a huge black abyss underneath for yucky things to hide. ). There is a piece of wood that we're not sure of its purpose and Brian saw one go behind it. So I bought some roach spray at the store and my hero husband sprayed last night. Ok, do you really want to know what the count of dead cockroaches was? You might think we are dirty, filthy people after you here it:) but really i blame it on life in apartments (not the dirty dishes i leave in the sink each night:) So far the tally is 35 large cockroaches and an uncounted number of babies. Thank the Lord i did not see one of those suckers!!! My dear husband and later our housekeeper swept up the remains. Ahhhhhhhh! That is so sick! To think we had no idea. From the other mom's i talk to at playgroup it's a huge problem here. Is there anywhere on earth where cockroaches and mosquitoes don't exist? I've never lived there--but want to find it!!