I bought a loaf of bread, coffee for about a week, some cookies and sugar for about a dollar a couple of days ago. (On the walk back to Shishya we passed a brushy part of area and there were so many monkeys right next to the road in the bushes! The babies were so cute!) I never really drank coffee religiously but since I’ve been here I crave it in the morning. It’s so delicious and always hits the spot! Abby, my roommate, is quite the little cook and she made pumpkin pancakes a couple mornings ago. SO GOOD!! You can get so many fresh fruits here. Papayas, dates and tangerines are all around. This blog should just be about all the food I consume here. Which thankfully, I haven’t gotten sick from yet. I need to keep it up! I’m not going to lie, I am a little anxious about traveling around India for a few weeks!

I read in the newspaper a few days ago that had an announcement about weddings. Whenever we are out driving we usually pass a wedding or two. People are dressed in flashy costumes and fancy clothing. There is music blasting and people are dancing and cheering. This is all happening RIGHT on the side of the road. The announcement in the newspaper was advising wedding parties to please not block roadways. I thought it was such a unique newspaper posting and request!

Another common thing on the side of the road and on the road are COWS. They are everywhere here and their poop too. Most of the time they serve no real purpose. People don’t use the cows for anything. The cows are a sacred animal to most people in the area. Our cows on the farm work though. They are actually used for something!

Apparently the propane people in India have been on strike, and if we run out we’re out for a while? No warm showers or stoves for cooking!

Rohan and I are still working hard during homework time. He needs help on his vowels. Thanks to Mom and Barb Pardee for sending me work sheets. If you have anything more that could help that would be great!

So Lisa, the new volunteer from Germany, is 20 and was working at a school in Nepal for three months before she took a train and bus to Shishya. She is being sent through a program to all these places. It’s pretty incredible. What an experience. She plays the violin and tonight she was playing it. It was so nice. Abby sings songs form fiddler on the roof sometimes and Lisa just happened to play a song from that movie tonight!

Abby said the other day she has to keep reminding herself that I’m 24. She says I seem so much younger. I used to think seeming younger was a good thing but trying to teach English to 8th graders and having them think I’m just a few years older than them makes things a little challenging. One kid thought I was 17 on my first day.

We are watching the boys this weekend. We go to their home in the morning and care for them for about twelve hours. We do this so their house family has the opportunity to take some time off. The families that live in the homes sacrifice so much. I admire them! There are enough volunteers right now that the shifts are short. For those of you that know me I LOVE playing board games and card games and stuff. It just so happened I got the shift on Saturday and Sunday for GAME TIME!!! Twister and UNO here I come! For those of you that went to the Southeast Alaska State Fair last summer there was a ninja acrobatic group there called Nanda. There is a boy in the home whose last name is Nanda and he goes by that name. I'm going to show the boys a youtube clip of them. Pretty cool! The boys were so whirled up during game time today that they managed to catch grass on fire? Wooooweeee so many hyper boys!