Kendra in India: Learning a language, being sick, and buying clothes

Wednesday: 

So…I took two years of Spanish but it never amounted to much. But unfortunately now that I’m learning Telugu a lot of it is coming back. That means when I’m trying to think of a word in Telugu I come up with a Spanish words. It also happens with Portuguese (which is saying something since I know next to nothing), especially when I’m trying to come up with the word ‘no.’ In Telugu it can be vaddu but I always want to say não. Hopefully it’s just a temporary phase that I’ll get through quick.

When we were at the temple on Tuesday we were asked a few times to take pictures for a couple people. Wednesday morning when we were at the Internet café they guy that owns the place passed me his ipad. On it he had the newspaper eeugan (sp?) and it had a picture of all of us at the temple. When we came back to the house Dr. Nnuckolls had printed off copies of that picture and another one from a different newspaper and gave them to us. We felt pretty special.

  

Today we went to Green Vision and met Dr. Prabhakarg. This is the program’s first time working with Green Vision but it looks like it’ll be success. I had no idea what green vision was apart from some medical focus NGO. Come to find out this guy has worked for WHO and CDC and has programs and connections all over India. His work is focused on health promotion and prevention so I’m very excited to work with him. Oliver it seems was a little disappointed. He just wants to dive in but I had to explain to him that since we were outsiders and we especially can’t lead a program. Green Vision will be awesome though. He has tons of days planned out where he or his staff will take us to the various projects and 5 different hospitals. Half way through the meeting where he was introducing us to the program he said ‘you know this is my first priority but second is music.’ He then proceeded to tell us that he has arranged us to go to a few cultural events throughout the summer. He is so eager to take care of us and make sure that he is there to help us out.

Thursday:

This morning I woke up about 5:30-6 with abdominal discomfort. With how much water I’m drinking and how small of bladder I have this is normal, especially when I don’t get up in the middle of the night to use the restroom. To my surprise I did not have a full bladder but instead I had diarrhea. I’ve been up since then laying on a spare bed with two fans blowing on me trying to rest. The diarrhea isn’t that bad but the abdominal pain with it makes it hard to sleep and becomes worse when I stand. Another fun part is that there is no air circulation (no windows vents or anything) in the bathroom so I have to constantly go to the bathroom in what seems like a hot box (sweat box?).  Apparently Oliver is sick as well but instead of diarrhea he is throwing up. I think I’ll count myself lucky. MOM: don’t worry I’m fine and there isn’t that much pain. Mostly I’m just sitting here exhausted and hot. Also we have a Dr. on retainer if we need him…though I will not need that this time. David: I didn’t even have to ask for coconut water, they just brought it to me. I’m a little disappointed that it doesn’t taste like pink berry’s coconut yogurt but if I think about it enough I can taste a little hint of it.

Addition: Jamie just walked in with some diarrhea pill. I’m supposed to take them two times a day for five days. As Dr. Nuckolls said, Dr. Krishnayya is like a mother hen. He will bend over backwards to help us (as apparent by all the appointments he has set up) and these pills he had to send for.

Today our plans were to go and visit a couple PhD students. It was explained to us that one of them had done some research on diabetes and that she would present her research to us along with the other students. I’m not sure what exactly will happen but hopefully everyone will take really good notes and let me know.

A couple days ago we went shopping for a few more kurtas plus a few more light shirts for the boys and fabric so that they can have male kurtas and pajamas (pants pronounced paw-jaw-maws) made. While we were in the fabric shop Rajalaksmi and Sudha had them pull some cotton (cause that’s all we’re allowed to wear in the summer) saris. As Lizzie and I were looking at the fabric those two showed great interest in what we were buying and kept telling us how beautiful they were. When Jamie bought hers on the first day from a store she did not get that response. Lizzie and I ended up walking out of that shop with saris that ended up costing more than we wanted to spend (though really in US dollars it wasn’t that much, it just seemed like it), and still needing three other cloths and a tailor to complete the sari.

The next day we took the saris to another cloth store to get more material. We needed under skirt material and some more material to make a type of hem over part of the sari so that the weight of the fabric will keep the sari down. I had no idea that saris required so much. Anyways I was talking with Rajalaksmi and she asked me if I wanted a full or half blouse. Now I think I mentioned earlier about my reservations about wearing a sari with garments. I hadn’t quite made up my mind until the pressure from yesterday but I was still uneasy. However hearing that we could do a full blouse was quite a relief. Now NO one here would wear a full blouse this time of year. It’s too hot compared to their half blouse alternative. Still, I told her that I would do a full blouse because I had an undershirt that would need to be covered. Jamie and Lizzie on the other hand got half blouses (if I wasn’t endowed I would have done the same). Rajalaksmi drew the conclusion that it was because I was married and was completely accepting of the fact. (She is one of our translators but an explanation on the garments not just being for married people would still have been way to much for her.) What’s interesting is that I have had so many conversations back home about choices I make due to my religious beliefs. Often they are received with pressure to do otherwise or some sort of judgment. However, because of her own religious exposure and cultural norms she was completely accepting of my decision. I wasn’t shocked but it was a welcomed response to the liberal comments prominent in social media condemning religious beliefs.

Well that’s all for now. I hope that everyone is doing well! I miss you all!

Kendra