First week home

I left India on Saturday, June 13th and flew to London where I spent the night, then flew to Chicago on Sunday. Breaking up the flight like that helps my jet lag greatly!  My cousin, Jerry Lee picked me up from O'hare and took me to his house to I could eat lunch and visit with his family.  Then he drove half way to Bloomington-Normal and my sister drove up to meet us.  I was easy to pick up since I didn't have any luggage.  My luggage gets delayed often so it doesn't bother me too much.  Usually it is when I am flying into B-N and my luggage gets stuck in Dallas or Chicago and I get it the next day.  I was a little frustrated this time though because I only had one layover and it was 13 HOURS  - how the heck did my bag not make it?!?!  I didn't get it until late Tuesday night.

Charlotte and I went to eat lunch with Christa, my cousin's wife on Tuesday and my aunt Connie came to visit me on Saturday.  On Wednesday, my dad and I drove up to Dearborn, Michigan to see the Henry Ford Museum and Greenville Village.  It was great!  When he first told me that''s where he wanted to go when I offered to take him someplace, I was wondering how boring a museum of Fords was going to be, but it was interesting.  The museum and village is more about innovation and inventions.  It had exhibits/houses from Heinz, Noah Webster, the Wright Brothers, Edison, and Ford.

Ford's kitchen sink engine recreated by university students.

Blair and I 

The chair that Abraham Lincoln was sitting in at the Ford Theater.  You can see the blood stains.

JFK's Presidential car - the one he was shot in

Reagan's Presidental car - the one he was shot in

Bus that Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat (it has been restored)

We stayed at the Best Western about 2.5 miles away and I had no idea it was the Pink Palace when I booked it, but it was FABULOUS!! The people were super nice and the restaurant had home cooked comfort type food.  My friend Blair lives in Detroit so she came to have dinner with us on Thursday.  Blair and I spent two summers being roommates in Ireland while we were at Grad School.  One of our other roommates, Janine is going to see her in late July, but I will already be heading back to India so I won't get to see her - bummer.

On Sunday June 21st, Natalie turned 2!!!  She was Due on July 21st and June 21st was my last day in the US before I went to Ireland for grad school.  I took Charlotte to the zoo while Brianna went to the doctor.  Everything was fine and they were hoping she would turn in the next month (she was breech).  My sis and her husband came to pick Charlotte and I up from the zoo and Bri's water broke and Natalie was here a few hours later - a full month early!  so I got to meet her before I went to Ireland.

Her birthday was also Father's day and she kept saying Happy Daddy's Day more than she realized it was her birthday.   Ben, Bri, the kids and I went to the pool to swim.  The girls went down the slide over and over. 

Brianna took this awesome shot at the pool!

 Brianna made pancakes with bacon inside!!!  delicious!  Charlotte and I iced Natalie's cake :)

It was a great 2nd Birthday and a great father's day!

Where is Home?

It is the end of the school year and many people in the international teaching world are talking about "going home".

People can mean a lot of different things when they say this.

Home means several things to me.

Right now when I say I am going home in less than a week, I mean central Illinois - where I grew up.
I means my Dad's house in rural Illinois surrounded by cornfields, cow pastures, and dirt roads.  The bedrooms, bathrooms, and sheds that I helped build.  The woods we went hiking in.
It also means my sister's house in the city about 30 miles from my dad's house.  Where I spend the days with my sister eating breakfast with the girls, taking them to the park, zoo, children's museum, and playgrounds.

Home also means Houston, Texas, where I lived for 11 years before I moved overseas. The place where I had my first real teaching job and where I bought my first house.  Where I made a lot of friends and found Jesus.  I hang out at Karin and Brendan's house a lot where I am "aunt Bob" to their 5 kids. Karin's gracious parents who let me stay in their house, use their laundry machines, and let me use their car.  My friend Stacy whom I met in college, was my roommate when we first moved to Houston together, and is from the city my sister lives in. My precious friend Jamili whom I met while working for the Girl Scouts in college.  My adorable friend Norma who makes me laugh more than anyone else. HOME.

After a few weeks in the US, I will be talking about going home again.  This time it will be home to Mumbai. Mumbai - my first international residence.  My flat that will smell like monsoon and have pigeons and crows constantly bothering me my flapping against the window and getting stuck in the air conditioner. Mumbai-where I can walk to nearly everywhere I need to go.  Mumbai - which will be my home for 6 years - which is as long as I lived in my house in Houston.

I am blessed that I have so many places that are home to me. 

End of year 4

It is crazy to believe that I have lived in Mumbai, India for FOUR years!

I had another exciting year teaching amazing 6th and 8th graders!  I had some of the 8th graders in 6th grade so it was interesting to see how they have changed. I was an 8th grade advisor again this year and was partnered with Aanchal and we had a fun, crazy year with our bizarre group of kids :) We went on a new Week Without Walls trip to Gujarat this year and next year Aanchal and I are going to be responsible for planning it next year.  That will be an exciting challenge!!

I finished my Math Specialist in International Teaching program and got to go to Poland, France, and Croatia for my last classes.  I am going to miss the teachers in the program - I have learned a lot from them!

I got to coach Math Counts again this year and the competition was in Abu Dhabi, next year it will be in Dubai.

Next year I will be the first Middle School Math Coach at the American School of Bombay!  I am really excited for this opportunity!  I get to mix my three favorite things - curriculum planning, mentoring teachers, and teaching.  Normally, I teach two 6th grade classes and two 8th grade classes.
Next year, I will only be teaching two 8th grade classes and I will be mentoring the novice teacher that is coming to teach the 6th grade classes.  I will be helping the teachers plan in all three grade levels.  I will also be pushing in and pulling out in classes to help kids who need more support and kids who need more enrichment.  I am really looking forward to starting this new position.

Because of my new position, I will be staying in India for two more years.  I have mixed emotions about that.  I love my job, but Mumbai is not my favorite place to live :)  That just means I have to plan some fabulous vacations to take my mind off it! For fall break in September, my friend Evelyn and I are going hiking and castle spotting in Luxembourg.  :)  If anyone wants to visit India while I'm here, you have a little more time!

We have a week left of school and I am headed straight to Illinois.  I have reapply for my Indian Visa because I am starting my 5th year so I have to go to Houston at the end of my break to pick it up.  I am going on a road trip with my dad to Michigan to see the Ford Museum.  I'm taking Charlotte on her first Amtrak ride to Springfield Illinois.  Our little adventure is my birthday present to her - we are both excited!  I get to spend a few weeks staying with Brianna and Ben and it will be spent taking the girls to the pool, park, etc.  Then I will head to Houston to spend some time with my friends and get my visa.  Then I am flying to Barcelona with my friends Norma, Stacy, and Stacy's mom so we can go on a cruise to Rome, Florence, Cannes, Majorca, etc.  After the Cruise, I am staying in Barcelona a few days to sightsee, including going to Andorra - my 31st country!!! Then it is back to Mumbai the end of July to start year number 5.  I am blessed!

Life with Mortimer

In November, my shoulder started hurting when I woke up and sometimes during the day.  I have Lupus and Sjogrens though so I am used to all kinds of weird aches and pains.  I was careful with it, but kept doing my normal activities.  I went to the gym and did my normal arm weights with Nilendra.  I would make sure to reach really carefully for the weights, then I could lift them no problem.  I went home for Christmas and my shoulder bothered me and I remember one painful experience when I was dancing with Charlotte and Natalie to Taylor Swift's "Shake it off".  When I got back to India, Nilendra went on vacation and five weeks passed without me going to the gym and my shoulder got worse.  By the end of February, I was in agony and could barely move my left arm.

I went to the physical therapist and they diagnosed me with a frozen shoulder.  I had never heard of it before, but I now know of multiple people that have had one.  It takes 12 to 36 months to recover!!  I thought they were exaggerating!  But the process has been slow.  X-rays showed that my shoulder was a little out of socket, but no known injury.  When I traveled to Croatia for spring break and I got bumped on the airplane and it hurt like heck, but I think it popped it into socket because it hurt less for a few days.  Then I had an encounter with a rough security person and it hurt again.

I could barely move my arm.  Getting dressed was time consuming, I couldn't shampoo my hair, or hold a plate in my left arm.  My kids and I decided I was like a T-rex.

During the month of March, I went to Physical Therapy twice a week and it hurt sooooo bad and I gained little mobility.  I started acupuncture in addition to my regular physio three times a week in April and I seemed to gain more mobility.   I still can't do normal things and it hurt horribly at night, but I allow my Physical Therapist, Ridi, to torture me in the hopes that I will someday get to use my arm normally again!

It has been a humbling experience.  I am trapped by the limitations of this new "disability".  I panicked at first, because all I could think of was when I was trapped in my body when my Lupus was at its worst.  I can't really do any exercise but walk, so I do it as much as I possible can.

The limits my shoulder has imposed on me for month is such a big entity that I gave it a name.  MORTIMER.    The kids ask how mortimer is doing every day.   Mortimer wakes me up in the middle of the night like a toddler.

I'm going home this summer and it is going to be hard to love on all the babies waiting for me in the US without full use of my arm.

I have to keep believing it WILL get better and I will run, swim etc. again some day.

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Today, I went to see Bosnia and Herzegovina

Dubrovnik used to be an independent republic and it is separated from the rest of Croatia by a 20km stretch of Bosnia and Herzegovina along the coast.  We drove up the coast and had to go through a border crossing out of Croatia, one into Bosnia and Herzegovina, and one back into Croatia.  We drove inland and admired views of the Adriatic Sea as we drove along the Croatia coast along the Adriatic Sea.

We drove through the Herzegovina part and headed to Medjugorje, which is known for a sighting of the virgin Mary by 6 girls in the 1980s.

We went to Mostar which was an amazing city.  It is known for its Old Bridge built in the 1500s  It was destroyed after three days of bombing in the 1990s during the war that separated Yugoslavia into six countries.  After the destruction of the bridge, the stone was dug out of the river and the new bridge was made with the old stone exactly the way it was so it could continue to be an UNESCO World Heritage site. .

We ended the day by driving down the Neretva River delta to the town of Pocitelj.  We saw the Haji-Ali Mosque and Sahat-kula, a silo-shaped fort on top of the hill above the town.  Everything was closed just as they were in many places we have been because it is not tourist season here yet.  

Montengro

Since I am on a quest to get to 50 countries before I am 50, I decided to hop over to Montenegro for a day while I was in Croatia. It was me and 8 other people with Super Tours.  We drove along the coast and stopped at the Croatia border check, then the Montenegro side.  It actually went pretty quickly.  Apparently it takes forever during the busy summer months.  We drove along the Konavla Valley and Bay of Kotor.  We stopped for lunch in Budva, went to Kotor and then stopped in Persat on our way back to Dubrovnik.  The drive was beautiful even though it was a cold, rainy day.

Small world story:  I had already started eating lunch when I saw one of our group come in and I invited her to sit with me.  Her name was Madeline and she was from New York.  She has friends that are living in Dubrovnik for awhile so she visited them.  I told her that I was here for a teacher conference at the end of the week.  She said the friends that she was staying with had a friend from Italy coming to that conference and she was going to stay with them too.  I asked if she was from Milan.  When she said yes, I asked if her name was Kira.  I totally think she was talking about one of the women in my math class!!!


Kotor had a lovely old town and we had plenty of time to explore it on our own.  I wandered around through the narrow alleys and heard laughter and smelled brownies baking.  The tourist season hasn't opened yet here and things were pretty dead so I was intrigued by the laughter.  I came across a group of young women in a little area with a sign that said "Shiloh Ministries"  I asked about it and had quite a lengthy conversation with them.  They were part of something called "world race"  where they do mission work in a country for a month, then move to another country and repeat that for 11 months.  I think they said it was a part of Adventure Missions.  They were sweet women and as I talked to them several people stopped by enticed by the smell of brownies and they got to share their ministry with them.  One of the women went to Illinois Wesleyan so we talked about Bloomington - Normal!!  The group and I prayed together before I left.  This encounter was a big bright spot in my day!!

Visitors in India

For some reason, not many people want to visit me in India!  Last Christmas two family members decided they would come and visit me this winter.  I went home for Christmas for 10 days then left to go back to Mumbai on Dec 31st with my Aunt Connie and her daughter -in-law (my cousin's wife) Christa in tow.  Here is a synopsis, but there are a lot more pictures on facebook if you want to see :)

We arrived at 1am on Jan 2nd.  We slept for a few hours then took a taxi to the Gateway of India where we caught a boat to Elephanta Island.

love the garbage by this sign!!

We did a little hiking and saw monkeys and explored the caves. I took Christa to the guy on my corner that is known for his hygiene with his street food and she loved his pani puri.  Connie and I had vegetarian chili that Jessie had made.

On the second day, we met Felix at the Bandra train station and he took us in a cab to tour Dharavi(a huge slum).  The girls got to try chai and we saw a lot of the Industries in Dharavi - leather, socks, clothes, purses, luggage, bread, etc.

Whenever I go through Dharavi it seems that one of the men ask about something someone is wearing and say that their company made it.  Christa had a purse from Kohls that the guy makes.  I have heard of several instances where items for Kohls have drawn attention.  Many of my clothes are from Kohls - I need to find where they make them here and buy them from the source!!  We also saw clothes being made for very expensive designers - especially Italian designers.   After Dharavi, we took a train to Crawford market and we shopped for spices and tea.  I ate a fruit I have never heard of - a chico - it had the consistency of a pear, but was firmer and sweeter.

We went to bed very early because we were being picked up at 3am to go to the airport.
We had a 5am flight to udaipur. We were met at the airport by our driver for the week, Ram.  He was excellent!! He was a safe driver, punctual, advised of great places to eat, etc.  I could understand about 75% of what he said and the others could understand a little less, but he had decent English.

Ram

He took us to our hotel - Jaiwana haveli (Haveli means courtyard - you see this word often in India). The hotel had hot water and a great rooftop restaurant where we had breakfast.  It looked over the lake and the people were super nice.  While we were eating, Ram arranged for a tour guide for the Jagdish Temple and the City Palace.  After exploring those, we went on a boat ride around the lake palace and went shopping.

We did a lot of shopping for textiles.

After breakfast the next day we set off on the day long drive to Jodhpur.  About two hours into the drive, we came to the Ranakpur Temple.  The girls got to experience Indian craziness.  We walked to the temple and after read the vast number of rules, decided to go back to the car to put away all of our stuff except our money.  We walked back and went to buy tickets only to discover that we needed our passports to get the audio tour headphones (which was mandatory for foreigners).  We went back to the car and by now, we are hot - we had to be covered neck to foot to go to the temple. Connie couldn't find her passport, so Christa and I went to get our tickets.  They have us three each.  One to give for the headphones, one for security at the temple, and one to keep.  Somehow when I got the temple, I didn't have my security ticket and of course they wouldn't take the third ticket!!  augh.  Christa was already in, but I went back to the counter.  They were not helpful - wouldn't give me a different ticket even though I just bought it 1 minute ago.  Another tourist was screaming at them because they stole 100 rupees from her.  Her husband had to drag her away while she was yelling at them to kiss her ass.  Ha!  I sat down on the curb in the shade refusing to pay again to get a new ticket.  They wouldn't give me my money back either!!  About 10 minutes later, the guy calmed down and asked me why I was mad.  Um.... because I paid to see the temple and you won't let me even though I bought a ticket!!!!!  augh.  stupid Indian rules just have rules.  I was not happy!

Ranakpur Jain Temple

The rest of the drive was uneventful.  We stayed at Hem guesthouse in Jodhpur.  I have stayed there before and it is in a family's house so the girls were sleeping next to the kitchen and I was sleeping downstairs next to rooms where the family slept.  It is a different kind of experience.  They said they had hot water, but we didn't experience it :), the streets were loud at night and it was truly an authentic Indian guesthouse experience.  The next day we explored Mehrangarh Fort and Jaswant Thada and went shopping.

view of mehrangarh fort from our guesthouse

 Ram suggested we eat at Pal Haveli and it was delicious and the rooftop restaurant had a great view of the clock tower.  We took a rickshaw back to the hotel and the they do not have meters like they do in Mumbai.  We drove about 5 minutes and the guy wanted 500 rupees apiece!!!  I refused and told him I lived in Mumbai and knew that was ridiculous - he immediately dropped it to 100 rupees apiece, but that was still too much.  Augh - they see white people and think they are stupid tourists they can cheat, but I was having none of it!!!


The next morning we drove the two hours to Manvar Desert Camp.  We took a nap, then Connie and Christa rode camels.  We went to the cultural show that night and had dinner.  It wasn't as cold at night in the desert as I thought it was going to be, but while we were eating they delivered hot water bottles to our beds and turned on heat blowers in our tents.



Transportation
They got to explore India by airplane, taxi, rickshaw, boat, train, motorcycle, and our feet!

Animals
They got to see lots of animals wandering all of the streets - dogs, cats, chipmunks, chickens, rats, goats, cows, water buffalo, oxen, monkeys, deer, and antelope

Food
Christa loved Indian food and tried everything she could and liked all of it.  She also liked the cheap, huge kingfisher beers!  Connie did not like curry, but liked many of the dishes we had that did not contain curry.  I can't eat Indian food and thought I'd have to spend days eating granola bars, but I was happy that we found plenty of things I could eat - naan, omelets, porridge, toast, and tomato soup.  I only had to resort to granola bars a few times :) They got to try chai and pani puri on the street.

Sights, sounds, and India chaos
They got to experience Bandra Gymkhana being really loud at night, honking, crazy traffic, walking through sewage water, using squat toilets, throwing used toilet paper into the rubbish bin instead of a toilet, my crazy titanic elevator, people peeing and pooping right in front of them on the street, people spitting everywhere, pushing and shoving, lack of hot water.