India Home

Well, here we are-  Chandigarh, India.  Or, as Violet calls it,  India Home.  It is really hard to know where to begin in describing this new little life we have here...
The house we have is nice.  But not nice in the way that houses in Berkeley or Chico or Seattle or any other town in the U.S. are nice.  As Tyler mentioned, there is no heat, except for an ancient little plug in heater that sometimes doesn't go on at all, and sometimes blows the circuits in the rest of the house.  But, back to the house--
It is brick on the outside, with a little yard out front with a plot of grass and many lovely large-leafed plants, and hanging vines with purple and orange flowers.  The house is two stories, and we three occupy the entire top floor (can't remember if Tyler mentioned this before...).  Our living area consists of a large room that is sectioned into a dining area and a living/sitting room, then there is a quite large bedroom with lots of dark wood, and a beautifully tiled bathroom.  Off of the living room there is a very pleasant "sun room" that is enclosed with windows and doors that lead onto a balcony where our laundry hangs to dry among plants and roots and vines.
This is all lovely.
But then there is the kitchen.
The kitchen has been a huge challenge for us.  We have a single-burner electric hot plate, a microwave, a rice cooker, and a fridge.  The rice cooker, the hot plate and the microwave all have to share one [very dicey] outlet, which makes cooking more than one thing at once kind of impossible.  Also, the power goes out sometimes, which makes cooking anything out of the question.  The first day we were here the power was off all afternoon.  So, not only had we just arrived and were in a bit of state of shock, but we couldn't cook, couldn't turn on the heater, and couldn't even drink water (has to be boiled or filtered).

BUT, my friends, it has been about 5 days now, and truly things are getting better every day.  Two days ago I spent most of the day in tears.  Tyler was gone at school, our power had gone off again (so no heat and a 40-degree house), I didn't know where to go to buy reliable safe food around our house (so Violet and I had crackers for lunch), Violet was a cranky teething mess, and then when I did finally venture out to get a rickshaw to Tyler's school, the driver wouldn't come down in price for me, and then pretended to not have change when I got out.
But then yesterday came, and suddenly things got a little better.  First of all, I am becoming good friends with our "Help" lady, Yoshoda.  She lives in a little place attached to ours with her husband, and two children-- one of which is an 8-month old baby.  She is from Nepal and speaks hardly any English, but we seem to figure out our conversations well enough.  The first thing that happened yesterday was that she showed up with a little packet of ramen noodles for me.  From Nepal.  Just as a nice gesture.  It almost made me cry (again)-- it was so incredibly sweet.  We talked for a while about her baby's non-sleep habits, and our baby's non-sleep habits.  She helped me figure out the washing machine, and this morning helped me buy bananas and oranges from the street-cart man (oh yeah, by the way, fruits, vegetables, and an assortment of other things, are all brought door to door by vendors on carts.  You have to bargain for them though, which I am useless at, but Yoshoda helped me get a good price)!
The other nice thing that happened yesterday was that the sun came out for the first time since we arrived.  While Violet was napping, I went out onto our sun porch and just soaked in the warmth.  I think it was one of the first times I haven't been cold since we left Seattle.
Then, after a nice lunch of hot ramen noodles and lentils and other this-and-that foods, Violet and I ventured out into the city determined to cross out of our sector and find a childrens' store that had been recommended to us.
So out we went!  With Violet in the front pack, we appear to be quite the scene walking down the streets of India.  Everyone stares at us.  But Violet is fabulous---  she always always starts to smile and wave.  And instantly the spell is broken, and everyone who is staring starts smiling and waving back.  Having her with me every day in this new place has made a world of difference.  She is a link between cultures.  Everyone in India seems to love children.  The women especially are very warm, and come running down from their balconies to come see her.  They pinch her cheeks and she loves it.  She is such a little ham!
Anyway, out we went.  And, ok, this is HUGE:   We crossed the street.

Streets in India are CRAZY.  There are cars, rickshaws (both motorized and human-powered), donkey carts, horses, bikes, scooters--- you name it--  going as fast as they can, and nobody ever stops for you.  So I stood there a while and watched, and then when there were no motorized vehicles coming, ran across hugging Violet as tightly as I could.

I can't tell you how awesome this felt.  It was though I had entered into some sort of Freedom land!  Suddenly we were in a different neighborhood, and actually on our way somewhere.  And because the sun was out, suddenly there was life all around us--  beautiful green birds flocked all around, and Violet was very excited to see a little striped cat sleeping in the sun.  We walked a bit further and found a good sized park with benches and grass and eucalyptus trees.  Then, we crossed another big street and there we were:  sector 8.  Chandigarh is broken into "sectors"-- they are basically little neighborhoods divided by huge streets.  It is difficult to get from one sector to the other, but each sector seems worth visiting for different stores, banks, parks, etc...
Anyway, we went in the market and what did we see?  Monkeys!  In the trees!  Again, Violet's day was made.  (as for me, I am a little scared of monkeys....  but I'm glad she was happy).  Then, we found a quite famous bakery "Sindhi Sweets" that was gorgeous~  HUGE glass display counters filled with every kind of possibly Indian and Western cakes/sweets/baked/fried/goods.  Violet and I got a little piece of extraordinary pineapple cake for 35 Rs (which is less than a dollar) and had a downright pleasant time.
Then, we found our children's store (it took some time--  the woman who recommended it said it was right next to the sweet shop, but I searched and searched and [feeling like an idiot] absolutely could not find it).  Finally I asked someone and he said it was in sector 17.  Then I asked the guy behind the counter in Sindhi Sweets and he practically lead me by the hand outside, and then into a refrigerator store, and pointed to a large stare case going down from inside.  
So down we went, and honestly this kids' store could have been anywhere in the U.S.  It was beautiful (in that very brightly colored, clean, friendly way that we are used to kids' stores being).  There were tons of toys, clothes, shoes, creams, etc....  I had to ask a man behind the counter to unlock a prized [and pricey] bottle of "nappy cream" (Violet has a bit of a diaper rash), and then also had to find baby wipes.  Also, I found a little case of colored pencils and bought them for Violet which then occupied her the entire afternoon.  We brought almost nothing for her to play with on this trip; we just couldn't find the space for anything more than a little back of plastic toy animals and a few Dr. Seuss books, so anything else we give her just absolutely makes her day.

Let's see, what else?  Well, we discovered a fantastic little Chaat place near our house where we can run to for fried goodies in the evening in case our dinner of lentils and cauliflower and rice doesn't stretch far enough.  Slowly slowly slowly we are discovering the beauties of this place-- the food, the people, the wild life.  It is all just taking its sweet time to reveal itself, and we are trying the best we can to crack the code of daily life.