MAYA'S ADVENTURES

Maya returns one year on....

2010-12-08T13:35:00.000-08:00

Exactly one year ago, a three year old girl called Maya, with a mop of strawberry blond curls padded along the tiled floor of Bangalore Airport, away from India, and towards England. She clutched a balloon in one hand, her Daddy's hand in the other and a head full of experiences of her year in India.

And now, one year on, does she remember anything when she pulls out some Indian clothes from her dressing up box?

Or when I serve up a meal of palak aloo and chapattis (the only Indian food to pass Maya's lips the whole time we were there)?

Or when I put some Indian music on?

Or when I light incense?

Does she remember anything at all, or have these memories fluttered from her head like long-forgotten butterflies?

Well, I decided to ask the little lady herself and find out....

Maya is now a very grown up four and a half year old school girl. Here she is on her first ever day of big school back in September, with little sister Lily:

When I posed the question to Maya, if she remembered anything about her time in India, she replied 'I remember the park.' The park in question was a patch of grass opposite where we lived, a bit pathetic really BUT to us in fume choked Bangalore, it was a little patch of green and peace. Every afternoon, when the sun had lost its strength, we would join the throngs to 'perambulate' around the paved exterior of the park (we were told on more than one occasion that we should skidaddle out of the central grassy bit as it was riddled with snakes!), Maya generally on her scooter and Lily taking her first tentative steps. Here's a picture of one of the many early evenings we spent in this park, often accompanied by an eight year old called Malama (who eventually inherited Maya's scooter) and her little sister...

There was a spot in the middle of the park where families often congregated and a large rock which the children enjoyed climbing. Maya liked running around the rock

and sitting on top of it, pondering her kingdom from the top of her castle. She's still an observer; a thinker.

The other thing she said she remembered about her time in India was Aanya, her friend from Kidspace Montessori School. This doesn't surprise me - the two of them became great chums and Maya still enjoys making the below photo into a jigsaw puzzle that I had made for both of them when we left Bangalore.

When I asked Maya if she remembered anything else, she said 'No.' 'Really? Nothing else?' I coaxed. 'No,' she said again, 'That's It.' Conversation closed. Oh. I couldn't help feeling a little disappointed....silly, isn't it. There were far more important things to talk about in Maya's world, such as the upcoming Nativity Play at school, or what colours she was going to use for her new picture (Maya's latest obsession).

I let it go, but a while later I pulled out a small album I made of our time in India. I started flicking through it, and Maya, always wanting to know what I'm doing, peered at the book. 'Oh!' she exclaimed. 'I remember

that....and that...and that!' As I turned the pages, she pointed out various things she remembered and scrunched up her nose at the things she did not.

I'd like to share a few of Maya's remembrances with you. As well as the park and her friend Aanya, Maya remembers...

Lily's yellow Rajesthani dress with the sequins

tropical flowers floating on water

Deepa

fishing with Daddy in a lake

Ganesh, the elephant God

bangles

mangoes

the gaping holes in the pavements

the colourful sarees

a beautiful Kathak dancer

eating from a banana leaf

rickshaws

learning chess with Daddy in Mysore at the Green Hotel

the jungle

Lily's 1st birthday

Maya's 3rd birthday and her tiger cake

the flaming red gulmohar trees

Malama

baths in buckets

sleeping on the train

school sports day

WOW...so, as it turns out, Maya actually remembers a huge amount. It made me think though, are these real memories? Well, yes, they are. They're just prompted by images, as so many things often are for us.

It's hard to believe that this time last year, my little girl was singing Tweenkle tweenkle leetle star with an Indian accent to die for, wearing bangles on her wrists

and bindis on her forehead

and experiencing her very own India from her Daddy's back

and needing very little coaxing to wear utterly gorgeous outfits like this

(If I ever suggest she wear any of her old Indian clothes now, Maya gives me a priceless 'You are utterly barmy' look)

Here's the little lovely now...

and here she is again (yup, she ain't camera shy)

A fantastic four year old who loves colouring, tap dancing, yoga (seriously!), books, bedtime, things being 'just so' (at parents' consultation, her teacher commented that Maya's favourite thing at school is 'the rules'!!, baked beans on toast with grated cheese, train journeys, singing and the cream off the top of the milk.

And so, it's the end of adventuring Maya for now. But take a look at this photo:

You see the little nugget in the strappy yellow sundress, looking across at her big sister? This is Lily Catarina, and she still looks at her big sister...for inspiration, for songs, for drama and for chuckles. Yet she couldn't be a more different character from Maya. Here is a close-up photo of Lily in India...

(this was after Deepa had got her hands on her to oil to hair and pencil in her eyebrows!!!).

And here is a close up of Lily now, aged two and a half years:

Lily's been waiting in the wings, you see, to take centre stage on her Mama's blogging patform. And although we haven't the foggiest where Andy's work will take us next (Mozambique? Ghana? Kenya? Mali? Madagascar???), one thing is certain - that adventuring Lily will be raring to go. To give you a sneak preview of Lily's character, listen to this song. It's a song called Lily and is by a brilliant band called Pink Martini and whenever it comes on, Lily flings aside whatever she's doing, shrieks 'Lily's song!!' and hurls herself on to the dance floor to wiggle her little hips. She's feisty this one...

...watch this space.

Maya takes on Twickenham

2010-03-08T11:55:00.000-08:00

This time one year ago, we were preparing to leave England for India. Boxes were being packed up, goodbyes being said and Maya, our two and a half year old daughter, couldn't possibly know what was awaiting her across the seas and skies in Bangalore. Now, one year on, we are unpacking many of those boxes in a different home back in England. Maya, at three and a half, often seems impossibly grown up, mothering me in a way that sometimes takes me utterly by surprise ("Are you cold? Put on a woolly jumper then." Or "Have you got enough tissues for your nose?")

Three months after we've returned, and is she missing India? Is she really? I have to be very, very honest and say no, I don't think she is. I've mentioned this before, but three year olds live in the present. Maya has thrown herself wholeheartedly into her new life here: the house, her kindergarten which she adored from the word go (what a contrast to starting her nursery school out in Bangalore) and she's even had a new lease of life on the food front, wolfing down anything in sight. Amazing to think, not so many months ago out in Bangalore that I felt it necessary to resort to a vitamin and mineral supplement syrup as she was on food strike for much of our time in India, only really eating carbs. Speaking of food, we chuckled last week when we went to our favourite South Indian restaurant for lunch and we were catapaulted straight back to the same old scenario in Bangalore with Maya only eating iddly's (steamed rice cakes), dosas (pancakes) and plain rice, turning up her nose with an almighty yeeeeuck! at all the gorgeous fare that Andy and I were salivating over. Lily, on the other hand, sat at the table, opening and closing her mouth like a little bird as I fed her mouthful after mouthful of all the spiciest food. She could not get enough of it!

But when I say that I don't feel Maya's missing India, that's not to say that she doesn't have memories of her time there, and some very happy memories at that. The most random of events still throw themselves up and she'll mention 'that man with the strange ears in the park in India' or a funny dance that Aanya (her best friend from school) taught her. She still calls aubergines 'brinjal', remembers the taste of chicoo (a sweet fruit that looks like a potato from the outside) and likes showing people photos of our Indian adventures. BUT. The head wobble has well and truly vanished. As has any trace of that Indian accent she sported, for example whilst singing 'Twinkle twinkle leetle star' and which I, quite meanly, encouraged for as long as possible.

Maya's Mama is really, really missing India. But it's important also not to look at our time there through rose-tinted spectacles and acknowledge that there were many things about living there that I found hard. There are things that I am loving about being back in the UK and other things that I'd gladly run back to Bangalore for - namely the weather! But I musn't be boring and moan about the British weather....Besides, spring is definitely round the corner and we've been preparing our allotment. As you can see from the photos above, Maya has enjoyed helping out and last weekend she did some raking and seed potato planting!

I thought I'd have had more time to indulge in this blog over the weeks and chart our return to England. But I don't, I really don't have time at all. I miss being able to write but I'm vaguely toying with another new blog at some stage. After all, we can all make time in our lives for the things we love doing. We have to. If I DO start a new blog, I ought to to do so before the end of July as this will herald another small family member in! That's right, I'm four and a half months pregnant, feeling rather large already and enjoying the sensation that the little wriggler creates every time s/he does a somersault. We like surprises, so we're not finding out, but as far as Maya is concerned, she is going to wheel her 'little brother' around in the buggy and he will sleep in her room (she's assured me that she's fine with it if we have a girl, but the conversation isn't worth having since it just IS a boy!!).

The purpose of this posting is really to draw Maya's blog to a proper conclusion, as I don't like leaving things untied. Thank you thank you for reading this and I will definitely do this again when we next go abroad, most probably for Lily. I want to leave you with some beautiful words I've taken from a children's book called 'Elephant Dance - A journey to India' that I bought for Maya before we left to help introduce her to some of the things we'd find out there. The words and images appeal directly to children, but this book has become very special to me also as some of the things the grandfather talks about are what I fell in love with in India.

Namaste and lots of love from us all

Maya, Rebecca, Andy, Lily and the bump
xoxoxoxox

'Is it hot in India, grandfather?' asked Ravi.
'Yes, indeed Ravi.
The sun is a most fierce fellow,
hotter than a hundred cooking fires.
At dawn he rolls into the sky like a fiery ball,
then he uncurls and he is a ferocious tiger!

'Grandfather,' said Ravi. 'What is the wind like in India?'
'When she blows from the western desert lands, Ravi,
she is strong. Like a wild horse, she stamps and snorts.
She snatches the children's kites and storms away with them,
beyond the hills and over the ocean.
Sometimes the wind is a gentle one.
Then she pit-pats through the trees,
hushing the leaves to sleep.

'And what is the rain like?' asked Ravi, as they sheltered under the trees.
'The monsoon rain is like a curtain, silver like Anjali's bangles.
It cascades like a waterfall from the sky,
making many mirrors on the ground.
Raindrops scurry to and fro like little silver fish.
When the sun and rain meet
they make a rainbow;
s-t-r-e-t-c-h-i-n-g over the sky.'

'Is it the sane as the rainbows I see here?' said Ravi.
'A rainbow in India, Ravi Beta,
is seven silk saris hung across the sky to dry;
red as the watermelon,
orange as lentils,
yellow as saffron,
green as the parakeet,
blue as the kingfisher,
indigo as the deep ocean,
violet as the storm-sky before the thunder growls.

'Grandfather,' said Ravi, as he got ready for bed.
'Do you love me?'
Grandfather put his arms around Ravi. 'Ravi beta,
you are as warm as a newborn kid,
as soft as the frangipani blossom,
as sweet as the juice of the mango.

And I love you very much.'

Change

2010-01-09T08:37:00.000-08:00

In the past month, Maya and Lily have gone from this....

....to this...

Our landscape has changed from this...

...to this...

The trees around us were green and tropical...

...and now they are white and frozen and magical.

Walking behind Maya and Daddy looked like this...

...and now it looks like this

And what does Maya think of all of this? Well, whether she's there in the sunshine...

...or here in the snow...

...she's the best adventuress ever.

Happy New Year!

2010-01-01T02:05:00.000-08:00

Maya enjoying the snow in Basingstoke

Finding the chocolates on the Christmas tree

Hanging up the stockings and putting out mince pies and milk for Father Christmas

A boxing day walk along the clifftops of Hope Cove, Devon

Returning from Devon to Basingstoke - worn out!

Happy New Year to you all! Wishing you all a fantastic 2010, filled with love and happiness and laughter.

What a whirlwind it's been since returning from India. Sometimes it feels like our nine months in Bangalore were a surreal, faraway dream . Children help us to live in the present and whilst Lily has been slightly more unsettled (I suppose she was just a wee one when we went out there and has no memory of life pre-India), Maya has jumped back into life in the UK with astonishing ease and enthusiasm. I knew she'd be happy to be back (she's an English Rose at heart, our Maya), but I wasn't quite expecting such a separation of that was then, this is now. It's admirable really, this ability to embrace our life as it is now with such gusto, without so much as a glance backwards to the heat and rickshaws and chai and cows and swaying palms......

....but is it really all forgotten?.....

Well.

Let's say there is something of a Bangalore hangover going on. For example, when I present most food to Maya, the first thing she does is cock her head on one side, eye me suspiciously and ask Is it spicey? Whilst she may not be making a connection with India in this statement, it still makes me chuckle and takes me back.

What else? Maya's little pink and gold bangles keep turning up everywhere in the most unlikely of places. It's funny, because she looks at them for a while and then puts them to one side. Maya has no interest in wearing them back in England, whereas in Bangalore she enjoyed donning bangles and bindis at least a few times a week. She just knows: That was India, This is England. And when in Rome, do as the Romans do.

There's also the comments that Maya comes out with out of the blue. Yesterday, for example, she suddenly said 'Where's my letter?' Which letter is that, I ask. 'My letter from Paula.' Paula was Maya's teacher in Bangalore whom she adored, and it transpired that she'd told Maya she'd write her a letter once back in England. But no sooner had she asked this, she was off, the question buried again for another day.

Yesterday, I made chai for the first time since getting back and suddenly Maya was there, by my side, being my helper in just the same way she always was in Bangalore, stirring in the sugar and spices and smacking her lips in anticipation. It doesn't quite taste the same over here though!

Then there's also the infamous head wobble. Naturally it's not as pronounced as it was a few months ago and a day will come when it ceases entirely, but at the moment the sight of our three year old wildly wobbling her head Indian style is too much to resist and I must confess that Maya's daddy and I are wholely encouraging it for nostalgia's sake!

On another note, we spent Christmas with my family (sans wandering grandparents who are still in Africa) at a beautiful place in Devon called Hope Cove in an old converted barn which was the biggest treat ever. Lots of running around country lanes, windy walks, amazing food, brilliant company (Christmas day was spent with some additional wonderful family friends), baaing at sheep and lots of excitement. We're now back in Basingstoke where the snow has all vanished finally. Amazingly, it became infamous overnight as being the most affected town in the UK when the snow fell recently. The snow sank all the way to our knees in the driveway and we very, very nearly didn't make it to Devon!

At the start of February, we'll be moving to South West London. Hooray, yes we have found a lovely little place to live and we're really excited about it. I've already missed the deadline for applying for a school for Maya for next September which seems to me utterly extraordinary but hey, no point stressing, we'll get the little lady in somewhere.

So all is good - we're all happy and healthy. Andy is loving his new job in London. Lily I think has been missing her routine a little from days in Bangalore and doesn't like having to wear so many clothes...but she's been brilliant and is getting cheekier by the day. Maya's Mama is also missing India....but I know I'll be back one day.

And Maya? The heroine of the blog? She is doing what most three year olds do so fantastically well. Throwing herself into life with boundless energy. Learning, questioning, taking things in, not missing a trick. And eating far too much chocolate over Christmas time.

Afterword

2009-12-10T06:28:00.000-08:00

A beautiful Indian sky on our final evening

Daddy and Maya at Bangalore airport, leaving India

We are back!

Maya watched enough tv on the plane to last a lifetime (her eyes had gone an unhealthy pink colour by the end) and Lily did lots and lots and lots of pacing the aisles with one or the other blurry eyed parent in tow. I had a whole cup of orange juice chucked over me, but thankfully this was towards the end, so I only had to sit in a damp, sweet-smelling soggy puddle for the final hour, which I thought was pretty good going.

The first thing I noticed when we walked out onto English soil, far more than the cold, was just how dark is was already getting by 3.30 in the afternoon. And the first thing that Maya noticed as we hurtled round the M25 was that there were no yellow rickshaws on the road. Just as well, as they would have been flattened in an instant.

We're now safely at my parents-in-law, and here we shall be until we find somewhere to rent. Where we'll end up is still a mystery as we just can't work out what we can afford at the moment, and it's a difficult thing to admit that it's not much!!

Maya is in heaven - she's with her beloved grandparents, is living in her Peppa Pig spotty wellies and has a whole host of new (invariably pink) clothes to wear, passed down from cousin Daisy. And of course there are all the sparkly Christmas decorations, trees and Father Christmas's wherever you look so yes, it's a good time to come back.

I've had a good long think about whether or not to continue this blog now that we're back home, and I've decided I'm not going to. Now, it's not that there aren't plenty of adventures to be had back here in England. But the reason I started Maya's blog was to record her months in India. I've adored writing this blog for her and a part of me feels really sad to stop, but I feel that the original purpose of the blog has been achieved and it's drawn to it's natural conclusion.

HOWEVER....because the field that Maya's daddy is in is water and sanitation for the poor, it is 99% likely that after 2-3 years back in the UK we'll be heading abroad again for pastures new. Maybe Maya's writing will be good enough by then to do a blog on me (tee hee) or perhaps by then I'll blog about her little sister Lily's adventures in a developing country.

The other thing I've acknowledged is that I don't want to just put a full stop at this end of this post and say hey, that's it. So that's why I'll still be posting sporadically to let you know how Maya's getting on (and Lily of course), how Maya's mama copes without her chai and curries and where the devil we end up living on this funny little island. I have no idea how frequent these posts will be. I'd say infrequent, so if you'd like me to drop you a line to tell you when a new post is up, please just send me an email to rnarracott(put the '@' sign in here)gmail.com

As I said last time, THANK YOU for reading this. It's a funny old thing, is blogging. I've always thought that I'm lucky if I get a handful of readers, so when I occasionally check the stats and see that I'm getting 30-40 hits a day, I'm flabbergasted. Now, I know that for blogging terms, this number of daily hits is nada, zilch, rien but for me...well, it's great and has far surpassed my expectations. On another note entirely, I was commended in a blog post competition for my post, Muddling through in the monsoon, which I was dead chuffed about. I follow the blog of the lady who won, Fran Hill. Well done Fran if you're reading this! Click here to see her winning entry, and you can also scroll down a bit to see mine.)

Ok, I'll stop jabbering now. It is impossible and completely inappropriate that Maya's mama should have the final word on Maya's blog. So here are a few questions for the little lady herself, utterly unabridged.

Mama: Hello, Maya. How are you?

Maya: Fine

Mama: How old are you?

Maya: Free

Mama: What did you do today?

Maya: Play with Lily

Mama: Are you happy to be back in England?

Maya: (Big definite nod)

Mama: What things do you like in England?

Maya: Balloon. Car. Bunk bed. The puzzles.

Mama: What do you miss in Bangalore?

Maya: My skipping rope. That dress, not the other one Banglore, that one, that stripey one with the pockets.

(At this stage of the interview, Maya goes AWOL and when I say I have a few more questions, she exclaims 'Lily do it!' Hmm.....Eventually she is coaxed back.)

Mama: Do you miss any people in Bangalore?

Maya: Aanya. Only that.

Mama: Do you like travelling or being at home?

Maya: Being....travelling.

Mama: What would you like to tell people on your blog?

Maya: (Dances a little jig) Just don't want to say anything to people.

Mama: What would you like for Christmas?

Maya: I don't know, you choose. We will see. Will we see?

(Obviously depends what mood you catch her in - last week she put in a request for a bike, a plane and a puzzle)

Mama: Maya, thanks for letting us be part of your life in India through your blog.

Maya: No (very adamant face), I haven't got a life.

(Mama laughs)

Maya: Well, maybe I got a little bit life.

Yup, I'd say you've got a little bit life, darling Maya. In fact, you've got a whole lot more than a little bit life and you've got so much to look forward to.

And I can't wait to share it with you.

You've coped so very well with being dragged to the other side of the world. And then back again. You are my little curly haired starlet and I'm proud of you.

Your Mama

xoxoxo

Blighty calling

2009-12-05T06:32:00.000-08:00

It's been a manic couple of days, packing up, seeing people, trying to fend off the encroaching ants that Deepa did so well to keep at bay...

We've moved out of our apartment and are staying with some french friends (airport hotel tomorrow night as we leave at stupid-o'clock the following morning) so I don't have my laptop, hence no photo which makes the page feel a little bare!

This will be my final post from India but no doubt I'll post something when we're safe and sound back in England. So here goes, off the top of my head, a few things that Maya and her Mama are looking forward to back in Blighty....

Maya is looking forward to:

the toys and bunk beds at Nannie and Grandpa's house, wellie boots, tights, sausages and baked beans, seeing her aunties, uncles, grandparents, cousins, splashing in puddles, jumpers and coats and Christmas time...

(Andy has just peered over my shoulder and chuckled, making the point that Maya lives very much in the present and therefore isn't 'looking forward' per se to these things. I know what he means, but I'd say that if you bring the subject up about going back to England, her excitement is palpable.)

And Maya's Mama is looking forward to:

peas, toast, seasons, cold bright days, composting, apples, proper cheese (not paneer), a comfy bed, having a soak in the tub, blackberries, recycling, long walks, pears, log fires, cooking with an oven, making granola for breakfast, catching up with family and friends, libraries filled with hundreds of luscious books, pizza express (!), farmers markets, pubs (yeah right, when do I get the chance to go to pubs these days, but in principle I'm looking forward to a cosy pub with a roaring fire!), sunflowers seeds and oak trees.

So there you go.

Both the girls are fast, fast asleep. It's been a long day for them and we also went to visit Deepa which was difficult for us all. But so necessary.

Tomorrow we need to run a few errands and then, if we get everything done and all goes according to plan, we'll go and have a swim and lunch at the hotel we normally go to. And when we get a taxi to the airport hotel, I'll wind down the window and breathe in the scents of Bangalore, good and bad.

Thank you India for being our hosts for the past few months. It's been amazing. And thank you to all of you for reading this and being part of Maya and her Mama's adventures.

Night night x

What will we miss?

2009-12-03T07:48:00.000-08:00

Thanks to many of you for your kind emails about Deepa's son, Akilesh. We're going to see Deepa and her family on saturday and I'll relay to her how much she is supported from afar.

The days are whizzing past...just a few more to go...and we're bracing ourselves for the chill of an English winter. Here are a few things that Maya and her Mama are going to miss about India...

Maya is going to miss swimming outside in the warm. She was pretty scared of the water when we first came here but is now a little mermaid. She'll also miss the stready flow of ice cream. After all, every day is like summer here! And not just the icecream, she's going to get a shock back in England when she finds that not all teachers freely hand out chocolates and sweeties!

Maya will miss her school and her teachers and all of her friends, especially Aanya. It's amazing to think how far she's come since those early days when she really, really didn't want to go. Now, she adores it.

She'll miss Monkey Maze, the great soft play area where we've gone about once a week since being here.

And what about Maya's Mama? What will she miss? Ah, there are trillions of things... At the end of my big trip to India in 2000, I had to travel all the way from Ladakh (in the far flung north) to Chennai (in the south) to catch my flight home. I think it took about a week of solid travelling so I had ALOT of time. And I made four lists: What I'll miss about India, what I won't miss about India, what I'm looking forward to in England and what I'm not looking forward to in England. I seem to remember the lists being very long, but after all I had serious amounts of time on my hand.

I'm sticking to the positive this time around, and am also giving you just a selection. So, first of all, I'll miss the colours that you find everywhere, sometimes in the most unexpected places. Like the license plate on the back of the truck above.

I'll miss the music.

I'll miss the fragrance of frangipani and jasmine. I wish I could bottle it up and take it home.

I'll miss Deepa.

I'll miss opening my messy wardrobe in the morning, seeing the wonderful Indian fabrics and colours to choose from (well, I know I'll have that again in England, I just need to wait till next summer...and hope it's a good one!)

I'll miss the palm trees which always remind me I'm in a tropical country. Speaking of which, I'll seriously miss the climate too - there are many things about Bangalore I don't like but the climate is amazing. Never too hot and never too cold.

I'll miss the food. If you gave me south Indian food 3 times a day for months on end, I wouldn't get sick of it.

I'll miss the tropical fruits that haven't been flown half way round the world.

I'll miss the tailors, the cobblers, the men who go round on their bicycles calling for 'paper' and the chai wallahs. You know what, I even think I might miss the rickshaw drivers.

But before you think it's all doom and gloom, next post I'll write about what Maya and her Mama are looking forward to back in Blighty!

Akilesh

2009-12-01T03:31:00.000-08:00

This is a very difficult post to write, and one that I wish with all my heart I didn't have to.

It wouldn't be right, or possible even, not to write about this since Deepa has been such an integral part of our experience in India.

Yesterday Deepa's five year old son Akilesh died.

If you've been following Maya's blog for a while, you'll know that Deepa is the lady who comes in every morning to do some cleaning and cooking and looking after Lily while I write. She is twenty-eight years old and a wonderful, gentle, calm spirit who works incredibly hard and is completely and utterly devoted to her husband and two little boys.

Akilesh went to school on friday, right as rain, but over the weekend developed a fever, was vomitting and had diarrhoea, so they took him to hospital and he was put on a drip. Deepa and her husband, Gopi, were about to take him home in the morning as he seemed much better but he had a sudden, violent epileptic fit (the first ever) and passed away. Sorry if this is unpleasant to read but, as I said, I really feel that I need to write this.

Akilesh was a gorgeous, bright-eyed, happy little boy. Over the months in India, Deepa has become a real friend to me and the truth is, I've never had a friend who's lost a child before. At least, not a friend of a similar age. We feel devestated, but of course our feeling of loss can be nothing in comparison to that of Deepa and Gopi's.

I just hope that in the next week before we leave I can be a friend to Deepa in some way as she has been to me.

Reflection

2009-11-28T06:01:00.000-08:00

It is chilly winter time in Bangalore: people are wrapped up in shawls, thick jumpers and woolly hats and Maya, Andy and I all have full blown colds. Oh, I should also mention that it's 28 degrees. Am I being serious? Yes. Are we going to get the shock of our lives when we arrive back in the UK next week? Probably. But at least we already have colds!

To change the subject entirely, I wanted to take you on a little journey down a road near to where we live. The way that our area, Indiranagar, is laid out is long main roads, known as 'mains' interestected by 'crosses' and cut across in the middle by a huge busy road called One Hundred Foot Rd. Several weeks ago, a rickshaw driver took me a way I'd never been before to get to my destination, down the bottom end of sixth main. It was interesting because I know sixth main on the other side of One Hundred Foot Rd, but the bottom end of Sixth main couldn't have been more of a world apart from this, and I decided there and then that before we left India, we'd all walk the length of sixth main to get a better feel for it.

So off we went on saturday morning, Lily and Maya on our backs, attracting all the normal stares and wide smiles. Here are a few of the things we walked past down the first half of the road (the part I was unfamilar with):

small shop fronts with hanging bananas,
scruffy dogs wheezing in the shade,
women carrying huge tubs of water back to their homes,
chickens pecking in the dirt,
paper mills and flour mills,
clothes strung up in front of ramshackle houses,
people doing puja at small shrines and temples......

and then we crossed over 100 Ft Road on to the other side of 6th main, the familiar side, and this is what we passed:

a French boulangerie,
an Italian gelataria,
an IT solutions office,
expensive looking bejewelled saree shops
and even a pottery cafe.

And I thought to myself, well this is Bangalore, isn't it. This single steet is a microcosm of this city. I know that it's common for developing world cities to have one foot entrenched firmly in poverty and another in new money, wealth and enterprise and a dual economy with a Hugo Boss outlet next to a man selling mangoes off a cart. But Bangalore seems to particularly represent such a dichotomy: this is, after all, glam IT city which Barack Obama is allegedly (according to the tabloids here) 'scared' of because of all the IT whizzes overtaking the techincal expertise of his own citizens. Yet, like any large developing world city, it's growing at a rate faster than it knows how to handle. Bangalore is bursting at the seams and it's sometimes not a pretty sight, though this is something that Andy has come more into contact with than me through his work.

Ok, hands up, this hasn't been about Maya at all this posting. But here we are, here's my Maya bit: if you look at picture 2, you may be thinking, my God, how much longer can this child really be carried for in a saree? This is a good question, and the answer is, she can't. Maya is three and a half and she's getting a bit heavy, even for superman Daddy and so this journey down 6th main was Maya's very last expedition in a sling. But what a great last expedition.

ps - As an aside, we ended our walk on saturday morning at the park we often go to at the top end of sixth main. It wasn't till after I'd taken the photo (picture 4) of Andy and Maya that I realised what was sticking out of the yellow rickshaw. Since I'd just written a blog on rickshaw drivers, it made me chuckle (double click to enlarge it) - I wonder if it was my boozy, drunken friend having a quick forty winks before ensnaring his next victim....

The ups and downs of an auto-rickshaw journey

2009-11-27T01:14:00.001-08:00

Maya and I have a love-hate relationship with rickshaws, though our reasons for this are very different. Let me explain:

I think we're quite unusual for ex-pats out here as we don't have a driver (not-for-profit company salaries don't stretch that far!) so when we climb into an auto-rickshaw, which we do at least a few times daily, the first thing that Maya is concerned with is the decor: Is is upholestered prettily? Are there pictures on the side? Can you see out the back? And bonus points, most definitely, are awarded for any sparkly or pink bits anyhwere or a Ganesh deity on the dashboard festooned with jasmine. If all this comes together, Maya more often that not will obligingly provide any information required when the driver stops at the traffic lights, peers over his shoulder and starts a conversation with the inevitable first line Your good name?

Maya's Mama on the other hand, as lovely as all this is, is far more concerned about not being ripped off. There's a funny thing about rickshaw drivers, that either they are the most wonderful, charming, polite men (and they're always men) imaginable who you'd love to pass the time of day with having a chat and a cup of chai, OR they are - and sorry to be so blunt - the most bloody rude, difficult, agressive con-artists in India. I dread to think how many pints of sweat I've lost in arguments with them. Where, I ask, are all the moderate in-between rickshaw drivers? They just don't exist, that's all.

Now, as you can imagine, sometimes Maya and her Mama's criteria don't conincide. She's all ready to scramble into a particularly lovely looking one when the driver, not even looking me in the eye, growls a fee about four times what we both know it ought to be. I gasp and start tutting and pull Maya back who's most put-0ut at this missed opportunity of travelling in this beautiful automobile with pink sequined peacocks adorning the side and thinks I am very, very mean.

Having said that however, Maya has over time definitely become wiser to the wily, unscrupulous ways of many of these men and if I'm being forgetful, often taps on the meter to get it turned on. If I'm all hot under the collar too, she's also been known to say to me 'Don't worry Mummy, he's a silly man.' Yes, and speaking of silly men, I've decided to come clean and tell you what happened in our early days here in Bangalore which resulted in the very sensible decision to only take rickshaws for short scoots around our area, nothing longer (Is our imminent departure making me more honest?? Perhaps more of these tales will surface in the coming days....) I'm going to give you the abridged version as I could go on and on but know you're all busy people.

We got in a rickshaw from an outerlying suburb. About ten minutes into the journey, he started swerving wildly, knocked a motorcylist off his bike (who thankfully was ok but very angry) who then came and yelled at the driver and, upon seeing us in the back, yelled at me even more, telling me I was a 'bloody idiot expat' for not getting a driver and going with these drunken fools. Drunk? Did he say drunk? At that stage, I'd like to have got out but we were on a busy dual carriageway. The motorcyclist drove off in a huff and then the rickshaw driver realised he'd brought us the wrong way so decided to turn round into the INCOMING traffic and drive the wrong way down the dual carriageway. At this point, I'd lost all decorum and was screaming at him to turn back. But he didn't. I remember Maya patting my arm reassuringly, telling me everything was ok and yes, we did finally get home in one piece. It's quite funny thinking about it now but at the time it was FAR from funny, it was darn terrifying!

So, the moral of the story is, appreciate the good rickshaw drivers when you get them....and check for alcohol on the breath and glazed eyes before getting into one.

Tinker, Tailor & Chai Wallah

2009-11-26T06:26:00.000-08:00

One of the many things I'll miss about India are the ubiqutous tailors, cobblers, chai wallahs, fruit and vegetable sellers and jack of all trades. You name it, they have it here. Even ear cleaners. (Admittedly I haven't spotted any in Bangalore but last trip, whilst in Delhi, a smooth talking, suited man in a park convinced me we musn't neglect our ear cleaning duties. And he did a very good job too.)

It's the tailors I'll especially miss though. They are absolutely everywhere and although they generally have the reputation of being unscrupulous, as far as I'm concerned they are amazing. For a small sum, you can have clothes made, altered, copied, whatever you want.

Next week at the creche I volunteer at, we're doing a craft activity making Christmas tree balls covered in different fabrics. The tailor in the second picture always has a huge jute sack of discarded material outside the workshop which I often take little tid-bits of. But the other day, I asked for the whole sack - he thought I was most odd, dragging the sack off down the road, two little girls in tow but anyway, yesterday Maya and I went through it all to divide it into a creche pile and a pile for me for making Christmas tags, wrapping paper etc. Maya immediately made a little nest for herself (picture one) and chose her favourite scraps for me.

I thought I'd also include a picture of another tailor I've used a fair bit here (picture 3) and his workshop. His name is Malek Malek and he has dark, brooding eyes rimmed with kohl and wears skinny jeans. On the other side of the wall of his workshop are framed prayers from the Quran and as you approach the workshop, something about the whir and clickety-clack of the sewing machine are strangely comforting.

Kisses for chappatis

2009-11-25T06:51:00.000-08:00

Maya knows something's up. Obviously we've told her we're Blighty-bound but haven't gone into masses and masses of details. But a couple of days ago she demanded that her Little Prince suitcase be brought down from the top of the cupboard and she's been packing and re-packing since then: 3 books, a bouncy ball, a t-shirt and 2 pairs of pants. All the essentials.

Having said that, Maya continues to well and truly live for the moment, in that wonderful way that only children are capable of. She is full of talk of her friends at school, the songs they are learning and ongoing demands for chai and cake. I had a chuckle yesterday when I picked her up yesterday as her teacher Paula told me that she was eyeing one of the little boy's, Eeshan's, snack boxes at break time which was filled with chappati and jam. Eeshan told her that she could try some if she gave him a kiss. She didn't even think about it....ah, the pull of chapatti and jam!

Time for a Lily post

2009-11-22T21:09:00.000-08:00

Here are a few things you might like to know about Maya's little sister:

* Lily has now reached the age of eighteen months. And she's never even been to A & E. (Maya had been three times by this age, though probably more out of parental panicking than necessity!)

* She has now spent half of her life in India.

* She eats spicey food like a trooper, a proper little Indian girl. In fact, she eats any food like a trooper, and people who says she's petite haven't seen the size of her belly.

* She is a dab hand at hailing a rickshaw. When we stand at the roadside, drivers are far more likely to stop if Lily sticks a finger out rather than me. After all, she's far cuter.

* She has humungous feet. Seriously, they are something to behold. Shoes that Maya wore age 2 are already way to small for her. Either she's going to be very tall or.....she'll just have humungous feet.

* Since her very short haircut (pictures 2 and 3), her nickname is now Bob. Had to be done, as she often couldn't see through that fringe of hers and steadfastly refuses hairclips.

* She loves her big sister with loyal fervour, follows her around and puts up with all Maya's bossing around until enough is enough, then gives her a good whack and toddles off.

Delicate matters

2009-11-21T04:46:00.000-08:00

This afternoon we went out for a lunch at a lovely South Indian restaurant and Maya and I came a-cropper in the ladies room. Now, I don't want to go into great details of intimacies of the ladies room, but here it is in brief:

We are used to loo roll. And loo roll is more often than not, not used here. Indian readers amongst you, I'm not saying there is anything wrong with the system used here....on the contrary, there's alot less paper wastage. However, what I will say, is that after almost eight months of being in India and I'm still not used to the spray thingumajiggy method. Many restaurants do have loo roll. But many don't also, and this particular one today didn't. And I had none on me. No problem, I thought, we're pretty used to this. But when I tried to....erm...spray Maya, I managed to completely miss and the water went all over her pants and trousers. And I mean ALL over her pants and her trousers.

'Don't worry, Maya' I tried to say cheerfully, 'it'll dry!' But she knew this was a plain fib, she was soaked and she was howling, poor love. So we went back up to the restaurant and there was only one thing for it: to strip. Now I'm not sure what the waiters made of this, but we hung her trousers over the railings so they could dry in the sun. We decided to draw the line at doing the same with the pants though. So Maya ate lunch in soggy undies. And Mama felt very bad and vowed to herself to aim better next time.

Exams for three year olds

2009-11-20T06:57:00.000-08:00

Although I'm really sad to be leaving (have you gathered that by now per chance?), I think we might be leaving at the right time. Maya came back from school today with her exam schedule. Yup, that's right, EXAM schedule. And yes, she may only be three years old but if you think that's plain absurd, bear in mind that the children in the class below her aswell - we're talking little tots of two years old - are also required to swot up for the upcoming exams. Okay, so it may not be stretching stuff but nevertheless, this schedule was handed over to me with a mighty serious look and firm hand today and I had to muster every ounce of strength to not laugh. I mean, really.

These exams go on for an entire week and begin - very happily - the day that we are going to be catapaulted in a big tin can over the oceans when Maya's Mama will be clutching the seat at the slightest sign of turbulence and Maya will be either a) goggle eyed to the tv or b) vomitting which she often does in planes, trains and automobiles. So no exams for Maya. Though I've got to be honest and say that I think Maya would love nothing more than to participate in some serious exams. She goes into complete raptures even when she has some homework to do - I'm not even slightly exaggerating. I think this little lady is going to love school and everything that comes with it. Whenever I pick her up, we always walk past a gaggle of young schoolgirls in their neatly pressed school uniforms and Maya just turns round and gawps longingly after them, mouth wide open. Would you like to wear uniform, Maya? I ask her and she just sighs dreamily and says yes. Which is good, because she's going to be next september. Ohmygod - next september??? Where did the time fly by to?

ps - Photo above taken yesterday whilst she was helping me make soup. Maya loves helping in the kitchen and has taken to her tasks there as seriously as her studies. (Not sure how much help she is in the washing up department though, bless her, as she tends to dunk a bowl in, slosh half the water over the side and then plonk it on the other side, as dirty as before!)

Next steps

2009-11-18T07:29:00.001-08:00

One of the first things that Maya said to me this morning was that her knee was paining. It was very mean of me, but I couldn't help but chuckle a little. 'Paining' is such a uniquely Indian word and when she comes out with such words I must confess that I do little to discourage them. Her favourite song of the moment, My bonny lies over the ocean, is another case in point. She puffs out her chest and croons 'My bonny lies OR-VER the ocean, My bonny lies OR-VER the seaaaaaaa!' It is priceless, I love hearing her Indian pronunciations and have started singing along in the same way. I know that as soon as we're back in England, these pronuciations will vanish, so I'm just trying to prolong it a little...tee hee.

Speaking of England, whilst we were back there in October, I posted a bit of a cliff-hanger blog in which I said that I'd let people know where Maya's adventures would be taking us next...bit unfair really as the information never materialised. There were a few different paths, you see, that we could have taken and the long and short of it is that we know now that we are definitely heading back to the UK for at least a couple of years. Andy has got himself a brilliant job in London (where we're going to live though is still being hotly debated!). We'll be heading off again after that but in the meantime, this means that Maya is going to be wearing wellies and tights again, eating warm stews and kicking through piles of leaves. I know she'll miss India but frankly, I think she'll be in heaven back in Blighty. There's also the question of family of course, and in England Maya will have them in abundance. She shed her first tears for Granny Amma and Thatha yesterday, saying she missed them, so we've assured her that she'll spend more time with them soon. That is, if the travel bug hasn't grabbed them by the throats and they don't bugger off round South America next.

So yes, two and a half weeks to go and I'm feeling ridiculously nostalgic already for a country that I haven't even left yet. I keep doing things like stopping in the middle of pot-holed pavements to taste bel-puri and other Indian snacks from street vendors and buying all kinds of crazy, unnecessary but very Indian trinkets. But aaaah, we'll be back....one day.

An ode to grandparents

2009-11-16T05:18:00.000-08:00

Granny Amma fixing Lily's travel tent at The Green Hotel, Mysore

Thatha and Lily tucking into lunch

Mama, Granny Amma, Lily and Thatha at Maya's sports day

'The simplest toy, one which even the youngest can operate, is called a grandparent.'

Sam Levenson

So Granny Amma and Thatha have flown away back to Africa. They went in the dead of night and I was worried that Maya would be really upset the next day. But a brief conversation had been held between her and Granny Amma, that they were going back to Africa but they'd see her again very soon. Maya mulled over this for a while and then asked 'Is Africa very far away?' Which reminds me, I must get her a globe (or 'the whole world' as she calls them) as she seems really interested where places are. So there were no tears the following morning, life just carried on without the grandparents. I know she misses them though as we put all the chairs together to make a train this afternoon and the first stop was Africa where she hopped off to give Granny Amma and Thatha a big hug.

Their visit to Bangalore was a great success on many different levels. Firstly, Granny Amma hadn't been to India for some time (in 1969 she travelled around the country by train, sleeping in stations to save money!!) and so it was something of a trip down memory lane for her. Often she would stop and exclaim 'Oooh, I remember that smell!' As for Thatha, it was his first trip to India but he really loved it - the food was a big hit with him too (speaking of food, we seemed to spend a disproportionate amount of time eating and also drinking beer. Quote from Granny Amma: 'This beer is really helping my cold get better.' And yes, she was being serious.) The weather was pretty grey, overcast or wet for most of their stay but to be honest, since they'd come from the blazing heat of Tanzania, they didn't seem to mind at all.

Their visit was also brilliant for Andy and I. Not only was it great to spend proper time with them (it had been a while since they left for Africa in January 2008), but Maya and Lily adored having their grandparents around as much as they seemed to enjoy being with them, which meant lots of little breaks for the two of us. We even managed to read the paper and our books!

Finally, as far as Maya went, both Andy and I noticed that her behaviour radically improved whilst they were here. Now I'm not saying she's normally a little ogre or anything of that sort, she's just a normal little three year old with her emotional highs and lows. But whilst Granny Amma and Thatha were here, there were pretty much no lows whatsoever. She was just so happy to have them there and was constantly excited, enthusiastic and lovely.

So all in all, a fantastic week. If you're reading this Granny Amma and Thatha, I hope you made it back to Tanzania alright and that you make it to Zanzibar. Send our love to the sea - we're so horribly landlocked here!

Maya's Sports Day

2009-11-14T03:40:00.000-08:00

Maya giving us a wave

The 1950's-style streamers drill

Maya with Granny Amma and Thatha, sitting out the Red Riding Hood race!

India's first prime minister, Nehru, was born on November 14th and as loved children, 14th November was denoted as 'Children's Day' after his death in 1963. To coincide with this, Maya celebrated her first ever Sports Day with her nursery school today. The event took place in a sportsground in Ulsoor, one of the oldest (and undoubtedly most chaotic) areas of Bangalore. It took a bit of detective work to find the location and I'm quite glad that Granny Amma and Thatha are seasoned travellers and therefore unfazed by stepping over streaming piles of cow turd and walking through building sites that would be cordoned off and the public kept at a 20 metre distance back in the UK.

However, once inside the high-walled sportsground, the sounds of the busy markets and banging and clanging from the roads being torn up greatly lessened. We sat under black-winged kites soaring overhead and a grey, threatening sky and watched as the children lined up in their little white outfits. Maya was so, so excited. In fact, she'd spent the previous two days tearing up and down our small appartment practising her running. I'd never imagined a child could be quite so excited about wearing white shorts, t-shirt and plimsolls. I suppose it was her first ever uniform of sorts, albeit for just a few hours this morning.

After the mandatory speeches from the visiting 'VIP' who tore pompously through the sportsground in his car, stayed to do his podium thing and then tore off again, the children then sang 'We are the world' whilst swaying back and forth and then all let go of their helium balloons into the sky. Unbelievably cheesy, but I must admit we were chuffed to bits to see little Mayita swaying from side to side and proudly holding her balloon as though her life depended on it. At one stage, the string of her balloon became intwined with another little boy's and so the two of them unwittingly had to stand and rock together.

Next came the 'drill' which was extraordinary. The children held coloured streamers in each hand and whilst commands were barked out from the front, their hands went UP! DOWN! TO THE SIDE! Granny Amma commented that is wasn't unlike what she had to do as a schoolchild in the 1950's. Again, Maya loved it and looked immensely proud of herself, bless her little white shorts and cotton socks. As for the races, she was meant to run in a race called 'Little Red Riding hood goes shopping for Grandma' (possibly the longest ever name for a race?) but by this stage, Maya had just about had enough as there had been so much hanging around and pent up nervous excitement and she decided to give it a miss. I think she'd put her heart and soul into the song and the drills and had decided that enough, quite frankly, was enough!

It was brilliant to see Maya in action today with her school friends. She has been going to Kidzone Montessori for three hours every morning and it's become a big part of her existence here in Bangalore, something that we know very little of. This has been her very own Indian experience and it's amazing to think of Maya's transformation with all the tears at the beginning when she went to school, to the excited, happy little lady that now willingly goes each day. Yep, she's done good.

Concert time

2009-11-12T09:20:00.000-08:00

Maya, 'dropping' after her shopping to recharge the batteries for the evening concert

We've been in Bangalore for eight months now and we have never been to a classical Indian music concert, so we decided that having Granny Amma and Thatha with us was the perfect excuse to go. We found something we liked the look of in TimeOut Bengaluru (though we were slightly concerned it may never happen as last time we tried to go to an event we saw in the magazine, it was in the wrong place, at the wrong time, on the wrong day!). However, luck was on our side this time and we listened to some fabulous Carnatic music with wonderfully named instruments like the veena, mrindangam and kanjira.

Maya was in great spirits as she'd had a good cat nap earlier on, half-on and half-off the sofa (oh, how I wish I could sleep like that) and spent the whole time at the concert jumping up and down in time to the music and running around the back of the hall. Thankfully, it was pretty informal and nobody seemed to mind (at least, I don't think they did....or perhaps they've been cursing us ever since). At one stage, she spent a long time standing next to one elderly gentleman who was drawing something on her hand. Maya loves drawing on her hand so I suppose she was quite happy for someone else to do the same. She kept looking at me and grinning and I thought maybe he was drawing a flower or something equally innocuous. When she returned to her seat, I was quite surprised to see a detailed biro drawing of Jesus on the cross. When I glanced back at the man, he gave Maya and I a knowing look and tapped his nose. Nothing against JC but this was quite...erm...bizarre.

Anyway, it was a great evening and now I'm pleased to say that Maya and Lily have experienced both traditional dance and music from the state of Karnataka. I do wonder how much of such experiences Maya will remember.

Custard apples and dancing

2009-11-10T04:03:00.000-08:00

A serious little face for the serious pursuit of dancing

Maya came out with two priceless comments today. The first one was when she was about to have tea and said 'Mummy, I have to do my studying.' Studying? I ask. Is it really possible that my three year old daughter is saying this? 'Yes Mummy' she says, and pulls over her school books, opens them and starts pouring over pictures of Indian vegetables like brinjal (aubergine), bitter gourd, ladies fingers, guava, amla and custard apples, and other pictures of regional Indian costumes. Ah, we're going to miss this country with it's weird and wonderful fruit and veg and colourful outfits.

The other thing that made me chuckle was when I put a wonderful Madeline Peyroux's song on (click here to listen to it and just ignore the bizarre images of ocean liners). Maya loves this song and started swaying around and dancing to it and when I joined in, she stopped dead in her tracks, fixed me with a glare and said 'Mummy - stop that NOW!'. Rather taken aback, I asked her why I wasn't allowed to dance too, to which she gave me a withering look and said ' You're not allowed to dance in trousers, you have to wear a dress, Mummy.' Well, that told me. Anyone would have thought from this comment she'd grown up on a diet of Strictly Come Dancing, but the poor deprived child's never even had a TV in her life.

Sad really, to think she'll be eating plain old aubergine, not brinjal soon. And she'll probably forget what an amla fruit is. But at least there'll still be Madeline Peyroux.

Mysore and sore knees and teeth

2009-11-09T06:55:00.000-08:00

This is my hundredth Adventuring Maya blog - yippeeeee! It makes me chuckle, because not so very long ago, I remember Andy saying to me 'Why don't you write a blog?' and I just looked at him like he was completely loopy and responded with something like, 'Why on earth would I want my privacy invaded like that?! Nope, I'll stick to my lock-n-key diary, thanks!' (It's not literally lock and key, but you know what I mean!) Funny that, because although I still love my diary and write in it a fair bit, there is something strangely, compellingly compulsive and addictive about blogging. Ok, let's stop beating around the bush and be totally honest - it's more than that...I am hooked. And anyway, I've managed to side-step the privacy issue (with this blog at least, not the other one) as it's Maya's world I'm scrutinising, not my own!

We returned this afternoon from two great days in Mysore with Granny Amma and Thatha. We stayed at the gorgeous Green Hotel where we've been once before. Maya absolutely adores this place as she has free reign of the palace (I know, aren't we posh) and the gardens and loves padding barefoot around the grounds, picking flowers and hiding in the palace's nooks and crannies. Mind you, it was pretty darn wet and windy (and cold even! Well, cold for India...) for a whole day and night and Maya skidded over in a muddy puddle on one of her forays and ended up with lots of tears and a badly grazed knee.

Highlights of our weekend in Mysore for Maya were visiting Mysore Palace at night when the thousands of tiny lights on its facade are illuminated and it looked just magical, eating lots of cake at possibly the loveliest cafe we've been to in India, meeting another little girl called Maya at the hotel which she was tickled pink by, being carried down Chamundi Hill on her Daddy's back and most immportantly of all, having her Granny Amma and Thatha around which made her one happy little lady.

A low point of the weekend was when, just as we were about to leave the hotel, Lily enthusiastically ran to get her shoes and tripped up. She fell forwards and knocked her mouth really hard on a glass table. Lots of blood, lots and lots and lots of crying and the poor little lovely's front tooth was even knocked backwards. Miraculously, it didn't come out but she now has one wonky front tooth, a puffed up lip and one sore mouth. Maya was really upset about it too and they didn't even squabble again for the rest of the day.

Back to school Maya goes tomorrow and let's hope that Lily isn't in too much pain tonight.

Granny Amma and Thatha

2009-11-06T06:27:00.000-08:00

Granny Amma giving the girls some African jewellery

There's been a great deal of excitement today in Mayaworld because her grandparents have arrived for a ten day visit! They flew in this morning from Tanzania and Maya has been beside herself with excitement. She was even sick in the taxi on the way to meet them ("300 rupees please sir'mam, for cleaning costs") and ended up having to wear Lily's tiny trousers. She also flung herself into a water fountain before they came out, so Granny Amma and Thatha were greeted to the sight of a wet, grubby little girl in short trousers aswell as an unrecognisable toddler, Lily. I say unrecognisable because Granny Amma and Thatha, for those of you who don't know, have been on the road since January 2008 (yep, nearly 2 years) driving from Cambridge to Cape Town down the west side of Africa (as you do) and now they're on their way back up the east side, having reached Tanzania. Yes, they are truly intrepid travellers, not like us living the life of riley in Bangalore! Click here to see their website.

A quick note on their rather peculiar grandparental names.....my mother said she never liked being Mum as it made her feel like a deoderant and I didn't feel, as I got older, like calling her Mummy. So by the time I reached India in 2000, I started writing letters to her calling her Amma as I was in Tamil Nadu and 'Amma' is Tamil for Mummy. The name well and truly stuck and she's been Amma ever since. So it seemed like a good option for her to be Granny Amma to Maya and Lily (ok, so it translates to Granny Mummy, but who's checking) and grandpa in Tamil is Thatha - and there you have it!

I must say we were fairly amazed to even see them at the airport as the poor things had a bag stolen last week in Dar es Salaam, filled with money, passports, Indian visas, camera etc etc - nightmare. But by the skin of their teeth they made it! We're taking the travellers to Mysore tomorrow for the weekend so they can see something other than the highly unrepresentative Indian city of Bangalore. Let's hope Maya manages to contain her excitement on the train and not vomit. Fingers crossed.

What's in a name?

2009-11-04T02:27:00.000-08:00

Becks & Andy, Guatelama 2004

People out here in India often comment, when they discover Maya's name, that we have chosen an Indian name. At this point I smile to myself and think, how much time have you got? Because yes, one of the reasons we chose this name was that both Andy and I fell in love with India independently, several years before it was our time to meet. And we knew this was a popular name in India. But there was much more to it than that. Lots of you know this story, but full moon has recently been and gone and I always wallow in a little nostalgia around this time...so here's the story of Maya's name. The other story....

Once upon a time a blond- haired girl met a curly-haired boy (at least, he thought she was blond until the roots grew out and his hope of catching a blond gal were forever dashed!) on a Guatemalan hillside next to Lago Atitlan, one of the most beautiful lakes in the world. They got on a bus together and travelled for two hours, chatting all the way without pausing for breath. When it was time for the girl to get off the bus, she knew that she'd be a fool not to keep in contact with him. And so she gave him her email address.....

A month later, they met again and did a full moon walk to the summit of a volcano. By the time they got to the top and dawn was breaking, not only could they see the full moon but also the shadow of the volcano they were standing on was cast across the valley. Words struggle to express this. It was awe-inspiring.

One and a half years later, this happened.....

....and in June 2006 this little beauty was born in our bedroom in Godmanchester.

We pondered over names, but it could only ever really be one: Maya.

Maya, which signifies magic and mystery in Indian culture.

And Maya, named after the wonderful indigenous Mayans of Guatemala.

Maya in India, November 2009

Maya and her Mama hit the shops

2009-11-03T00:58:00.000-08:00

On saturday afternoon I wanted to go to Commercial Street to buy some material for some skirts I'm going to have made (my favourite ten-year-old skirt has well and truly had it so I'm having some copies made). Maya came along with me to experience the hustle and bustle of Commercial Street which is, as the name suggests, a hive of buying, selling and bargaining. You can get anything related to clothes here, from Levi jeans to richly embroidered sarees to heavy gold jewellery. Maya loved looking at all the bright colours and sparkly tops and even obliged numerous shopkeepers by sharing her name and age with them, something she often keeps very secret!

I found some material quite quickly and thought it would be a shame to go home so quickly after we'd come all this way so we browsed up and down Commercial street as well as the warren of little streets around it. Maya's Mama got a bit carried away and, as well as the material, ended up with bangles, bindi's, toe-rings and sandals! (Or chappals as they're known here - in fact, you can just about see the chappals I went for in the top picture: top row, second from left, with the blue straps!)

The chappal seller was particularly friendly and let Maya try on some sparkly heels (her idea, not mine!). Lots of cheek pinching ensued which normally would have resulted in a good slapping, but Maya was up for it on this occasion and gave him her best beam instead.

We ended our shopping spree with chocolate ice cream and masala tea at a brilliant place called Woody's with whirring wooden fans and people crammed in on high stools gobbling up dosas and sickly sweet puddings. Maya dropped half her ice-cream on the floor which a smart-looking lady promptly put her smart-looking shoe in. However, she didn't notice as she was so intent on ordering so Maya and I thought this was a good moment to sidle quietly away from her....

Who needs sleep anyway?

2009-11-01T02:34:00.000-08:00

As I was commiserating just the other day, Andy and I don't really get the chance to go out in the evenings as we haven't found a babysitter. Deepa is prepared to come sometimes but likes to leave by half nine, so it's hardly a rock n roll night out for us. Anyway, an English/Swedish couple that we recently met invited us to a party last night and we thought we'd ask Deepa to stay the whole night so she didn't have to worry about getting home late. We offered her a good sum of money and she said she'd do it. After the last occasion Deepa babysat, we came home to a bit of a surprise (click here to see) but we really needed a night out and it was a much better idea asking her to stay over rather than be constantly clock-watching to get home. Or so we thought.....

Before we left, in light of what happened last time, we asked Deepa firstly that the girls should go to bed at around 7.30 and secondly for her not to feed them chocolate. But they'll ask for it, Deepa responded. Hmmm....the phrase 'Doesn't mean you have to give it to them' doesn't really work here. I turned to Maya and reiterated that she shouldn't ask for chocolate, to which she responded with an enormous toothy grin and said 'I won't!' in the most unconvincing voice I'd ever heard. No matter, we thought, we were just looking forward to our night out and duly escaped.

Anyway, the bar was fun, the party was great and when we got back at around half midnight can you imagine our surprise when we opened the door to our apartment only to find all the lights on and Deepa...AND her husband...AND her two boys (aged 2 & 5) all fast asleep on the floor!!! We just stared at them all, comatosed on the floor, completely flabbergasted! After turning the lights off and going into our room, Andy and I dissolved into laughter. The poor things, it didn't look very comfortable as we'd only provided one mattress but they didn't seem too bothered by this. We had a good old chuckle, that is, until Deepa's two year old had a barney in the middle of the night...and then her kids were awake at stupid-a-clock this morning, tearing around the sitting room on the scooter. Grrrrrr!

When Maya surfaced a bit later she came into see us and proudly announced that she hadn't asked for chocolates. Well done Maya, I said groggily. No, she continued, no chocolate. But I did ask for biscuits! Ah well, you can't blame a kid for trying. After Deepa et famille had left and the day progressed, it became quite clear that Maya and Lily were rather tired to put it mildly. Lily actually fell asleep mid-mouthful at lunch and I had to hold her head back so her face wouldn't fall into the palak aloo. Here's the thing: I'm sure that Deepa honestly thinks I'm joking when I say that the girls need to go to bed at half seven. I mean, which parents in their right mind would be so cruel and strange to put their children to bed so early? After all, that's when all the fun happens - after dark. Bearing in mind that she often tells me her own kids go to bed around eleven (the same time as her), I have more than a hunch that Maya and Lily didn't go to bed anywhere close to seven thirty, particularly as her boys came into join the fun and there were far too many Charlie & Lola episodes to watch, balloons to play with and scooter races to be had. Yeah. Who needs sleep anyway?

Needless to say, Maya had passed out by 6pm this evening.

The saving grace of chai

2009-10-30T04:49:00.000-07:00

Maya rarely has a lunchtime nap these days but if she does, boy is she in a bad mood. This afternoon when she woke up she howled and I mean howled inconsolably for close to half an hour. All she wanted was daddy. I tried reading her stories (she chucked the books in the opposite direction), I tried a good old cuddle (she kicked me) and I even tried giving her biscuits for heavens sake but no, she didn't want them. She just wanted daddy. I looked at the time and realised we had at least another two hours before the haloed daddy would appear. Despairingly I scratched my head and muttered to myself that I was going to make a chai. The howling suddenly subsided and she peered up at me through her tear-dampened curls. 'Chai?' she asked. 'Yes, Maya chai.' She jumped up from the sofa. 'Oooh, can I help you?' Amazing. Absolutely amazing.

So, I went and fetched the chai box of magic ingredients and we sat on the floor and put it all into the pot. I can't vouch that this is the authentic Indian chai, but this is the one we drink and it's YUM.

Maya's Magic Recipe for Mood-Enhancing Chai
(Serves 2)

Take about 6 cardamom pods
about 6 cloves
Half an inch of fresh ginger chopped up (or powder will do)
A little bit of cinnamon bark (or powder)
A bog standard tea bag
One cup of milk & one of water
As much sugar as your stomach/teeth can take

Put it all in a pot and bring it to the boil.
Simmer for about 10-15 minutes then turn off the heat and let it sit for a while to let the yummy flavours infuse.

De-lish.

ps - the photo above was not taken this afternoon during the chai episode, it's just Maya a few days ago doing her best woe-is-me forlorn face. I think if I'd tried to take a picture of her this afternoon she would've bit me.

The Mother Uncovered

2009-10-29T05:39:00.000-07:00

Since this blog is focussed on Maya, you may well wonder what the devil I do with myself all the time. So I thought I'd write a little blog on me and what I get up to here in Bangalore. As you know, we are hugely, massively, astonishingly privileged to have the wonderful Deepa helping out for three hours in the morning. By the time she's purged the place of ants, I get anywhere from one and a half to two hours to myself and this is time for me to write. During the past years I managed about this much in a whole week to satiate my passion if I was very, very lucky so I still have to pinch myself sometimes as it feels too good to be true. I write anything and everything from articles to haikus, short stories, blogs and, up until going back to England, I was writing my novel (about half way there - watch this space!). Since being back this time round, I've put the novel on hold to devote my precious morning time to my latest idea - a creative writing website for busy women which I'm reeeeeally excited about. It's still early days but it's slowly but surely coming together, so watch that space too!

One morning a week I go to a creche to help out with kids aged 2-6. So often we see families labouring on the roadsides, building houses or carrying heavy loads of cement on their heads. It is heartbreaking to see many of their children also helping with the work, but if they're not, generally they are playing on the side of the road and obviously not getting an education. The place I go to is a convent which also runs this small creche for such children at the cost of 50 rupees a month (about 7o pence) to enable them to be educated and to be in a different environment. I finish my morning covered in chalk, glitter, snot and God knows what else and I don't know about an education but on the whole, the children love being there, playing with others and with us. When I walk into the room, their little hands fly to their foreheads (it's bizarre, it's like a military salute) and they screech Good Morning Auntie! They are wonderful and I'm going to miss them.

Two evenings a week I go to a very unusual yoga class. It's called Bharat Thakur Artistic yoga and whilst I don't kid myself for a second that I look artistic, I definitely get some good exercise. I also have Reiki to help me sleep sweetly. What else? I seek out places that have good cake, feel the leaves of the bushes to keep myself grounded in nature in the middle of this crazy city, drink lots of chai, curse the frenetically noisy dogs that yap through the night, write pages and pages in my diary (yes, as well as all the other writing) and stick in little things that will one day remind me of India, stand at the vegetable stalls and marvel at the colours and textures, buy TimeOut Bangalore just to torture myself with what I'm missing (we can't find a babysitter!), stick Maya's artwork all around the walls and think to myself again and again, how lucky we are to be here. Oh, and I take lots of photos, especially of Indian film posters peeling off walls (like the one above) - people think I am craziness personified.

Downright weird

2009-10-27T04:04:00.000-07:00

The other day we went for a walk and I noticed that a crowd of men had gathered and were looking in our general direction. Oooh, I thought, what's the interesting sight? And I looked behind me, only to see absolutely nothing before remembering that actually WE are the interesting sight. In fact, we're not just an interesting sight, we are a downright WEIRD sight. A family of westerners walking along the side of a busy road (I will never get used to the fact there are no pavements in Bangalore), and not only that but the children are being carried on the backs, the bigger child fastened to her daddy's back by something their wives normally wear. Honestly, if a group of three headed green aliens had landed I don't think they'd attract anymore attention than us. It's just as well that I'm quite short-sighted, otherwise I think I'd start getting paranoid.

Surya the Pink Bear

2009-10-25T07:52:00.000-07:00

Can you see the pink bear with wings in the middle of the yoga mat between Maya and I. No? Look a little closer...can you see her now? Still not? Well, neither can I. That's because only Maya can see her. She is an imaginary friend who flew into Maya's life about one week ago. She is a friendly pink bear by the name of Surya and she has detachable wings. Which I think is great. I've asked Maya to ask Surya if I can borrow them but the request has been declined.

Surya sleeps alot. Maya is often tiptioeing out of our bedroom and softly closing the door so we don't wake her. But when she's not asleep, here are some of the things that Surya likes:

* Doing yoga with us
* Getting herself clean in the pink bucket
* Doing jigsaws with Maya

And here are some of the things that Surya doesn't like:

* Being disturbed if she's not in the mood for playing
* Loud noises
* Having to eat first course before she gets pudding

Sound familiar?

Bangalore with children

2009-10-23T21:24:00.000-07:00

I've just had an article published on a travel website, Transitions Abroad, about living in Bangalore with children. There's some funny photos too. Take a look:

http://www.transitionsabroad.com/listings/living/articles/living-in-bangalore-india-as-an-expat-with-children.shtml

Touch-me-not

2009-10-23T08:12:00.000-07:00

In the mornings, Maya comes upstairs to the flat roof with me to hang Lily's nappies up in the sun where they dry really quickly. She likes to hand me the pegs and walk along the piping, looking out over the Bangalore skyline.

This afternoon, I was a bit tired and grumpy, Maya was a bit tired and grumpy and Lily, who had barely left the house all day was getting cabin fever and hence was also grumpy. By about quarter to five we managed to get ourselves out to the park over the road where the girls fought over the scooter and picked leaves and flowers. I know I've mentioned touch-me-nots before, the delicate little leaves that close up when you touch them. The really are a marvel and Maya loves stroking their delicate little spine, watching it shyly close in on itself. In fact, you don't have to even touch it, you just go near and the leaves start quivering and recoiling. Watching Maya stroke leaf after leaf, I mused how she was not so dissimilar: on her own turf and on her own terms, she is a confident, forthright little girl. But if people invade her space or touch her when she is not comfortable with them, she literally closes up; shuts down. The same goes for friends - with one or two others she is fine but more than that and she would rather be on her own.

For the first week back at school, the teachers told us that Maya was quite withdrawn and they're still not having any luck encouraging her to participate in the running. This is all sounding very serious and I don't mean it to. I'm not worried about her as I know Maya and know that yes, she is a little shy, but she is a happy and balanced child. My wonderful primary teacher who I was recently re-united with commented that as a little girl I was 'painfully shy' and it's not as though I have a problem with that now. I got a book from the library the other day (yes, the library that I was perhaps unfairly moaning about) called 'I'm feeling shy', all about situations where children feel shy. Maya actually really likes it and has asked me to read it to her several times. I can virtually see the cogs turning in her head as I read it to her. There's an awful lot going on up there.

Maya's going to be an independent little lady, that's for sure. But it's been amazing to watch her character grow and develop whilst we've been in India as well as hear her vocabulary explode which of course enables her to express herself better.

Muvva Earf

2009-10-21T06:57:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned it before, but my favourite shop in Bangalore (by far) is called Mother Earth. It is on the side of a wheezing, noisy, stinky highway but the second you walk in, blissful calm descends and you are in a treasure trove of beautiful artisan products made all over India. Since we've been living here, we're often stuck for things to do in the afternoon so we end up doing the same things again and again. Our weekly trip to the children's library followed by a visit to Mother Earth has become quite religious and if I'm being honest, the library has just become an excuse to go to Mother Earth (which is on the way back and is how I spotted it in the first place). We've taken out every decent book from the library anyway and so have now resorted to borrowing Maya's favourite books for a second round. I think I'll stop pretending soon that it's still a worthwhile trip and we'll cut to the chase and head straight for Mother Earth, or 'Muvva Earf' as Maya endearingly calls it.

There's a good reason why Maya has grown fond of the place too. For a start, all the staff there know her name and treat her like an old friend (I'm sometimes a bit embarrassed how often we go there!); then there are all the beautifully vibrant colours everywhere you look and lots of stairs to run up and down. But the real gem for Maya (well, maybe a teeny bit for me too) is the top floor. On the top floor of Mother Earth's three floors is a little cafe with rattan chairs and ginger and apple milkshakes, date and jaggery pie and chocolate and walnut brownies all nestled in amongst batique wall hangings and Indian rugs and yes, we are in heaven. Maya tried her first ever chai here and was immediately hooked. Whilst I sit back and finish my own chai, listening to the fabulous tribal music they always play, Maya and Lily run amok amongst the photo frames and quilts and also various breakable objects which obviously makes me feel quite nervous but all the doting staff keep a friendly eye on them.

Oooh, I'm going to miss Muvva Earf when we leave. But having said that, I don't think I'll need to all that much as my challenge is going to be not buying the whole store out to put in our future farmhouse (he he, dream on!). Any requests, let me know.

Lily in Pictures

2009-10-19T06:54:00.001-07:00

Here are a few photos of Lily Catarina, lovelier and feistier than ever. This was taken on holiday at the Karnatakan coast when she'd wander around with my old head scarf wrapped around her and Andy and I jokingly called her the wild child because of her untameable hair.

Lily loved the freedom of the beach. She spent ages padding around in the sand moving shells from one place to another. And then moving them back again.

Because Lily spends time in the mornings with Deepa, she seems to genuinely enjoy sweeping and can often be found with the brush in her hand. Here she is wearing a shirt of Maya's which her big sister refuses to wear (like most other clothes!), so I've turned it into a dress for Lily.

Here's Lily back in England when her hair went a little static after some trampoline bouncing at Uncle Leo's.

Fresh and clean after bath time at Auntie Louisa and Uncle Nick's house and ready for more action. Lily has an endless well of energy, smiles and waves.

Back in Bangalore, she's still too little to object to her Mama dressing her up so I'm making the most of it while it lasts!

This afternoon at the park, a look of surprise as Maya spins her round this creaky old thing.

Lily is adventurous and brave and wants to try everything out, especially if her sister is doing something. Here she is about to have a swing on the rope.

Happy Diwali

2009-10-17T07:38:00.001-07:00

Traditional Diwali Rangoli in front of someone's house

Lily and I dressed up for Diwali

Today is Diwali, the festival of lights, which celebrates the symbolic triumph of goodness and light over evil (well, it's a great deal more than that, but that's the abridged version!). On one hand, it feels a little like Christmas here as everything closes up for a few days while people head home, plus there are lovely twinkly lights strung everywhere you look. On the other hand, it feels like an extreme version of bonfire night. I say extreme because, as I write, the bangs, fizzes, hisses, crackles and pops outside are unbelievably noisy and relentless. I'm not kidding, it sounds like World War Three out there. The fireworks and firecrackers started a few days ago, today is the big day (I hope!) and I imagine they won't subside for another few days still. I was literally about to write that it's a miracle the girls are sleeping through it but I thought too soon as Lily has just woken up after a loud fire cracker explosion outside the bedroom window and the poor girl is now a-howlin....five minutes later and she's sound asleep again. Fingers crossed for tonight...

At school, Maya decorated a small oil burner with paint and glitter to bring in the festive season and she's now barely raising an eyebrow at all the noise, she's become so accustomed to it. At the beginning, she thought it was thunder and the poor girl looked terrified but today she announced very proudly, 'I like fire crackers!'. That's more than can be said for her Mama - fireworks are one thing, but in my view, firecrackers that just make a humungous bang and let off lots of smoke, well what's the point?! Or mabye I'm just getting old....Either way, wishing each and every one of our readers a happy DIWALI !!!!

Maya is back in Bangalore!

2009-10-15T08:37:00.000-07:00

Andy and I weren’t hugely looking forward to the flight back to India (to be fair, does anybody look forward to a long haul flights with a one and three year old? If there’s anyone out there, please please let me know how and why.) Both Maya and Lily surpassed our expectations though and, unlike last time, got some shut eye. Maya didn’t, however, manage to stay clean. The poor girl had been feeling unwell for several days but it wasn’t until our departure date that she really felt poorly. Once on the plane, we thought it would be wise to keep a sick bag near her. Just in case. Approximately five minutes after take off, Maya croaked ‘Bag! Bag!’ And whilst the ridiculous parents flailed about wildly trying to locate the ‘sensibly positioned’ bag, Maya did all she could to keep it in…but we ran out of time and she vomited everywhere. Now, as we’re such well-prepared, forward-thinking parents, obviously we’d brought along plenty of spare clothes for the journey….yeah right. Under the seat went the sicked-on top and back on went the thick winter hoody she was wearing earlier at the airport, the perfect garment for arrival in hot, sticky India. Lesson learnt: If your kid tells you they’re going to be sick on a plane, they probably mean it. Oh, and it’s a good idea not to lose the sick bag at this moment in time.

Anyway, we’re all back in Bangalore in one piece and I must say that as soon as we’d entered our apartment, Maya seemed genuinely, joyously happy to be here. She ran around in an upbeat craze being re-united with her doll Sophie, her yellow scooter and her pink plastic cup. Ah, the simple pleasures. The first afternoon back, I thought I’d take the girls to the park over the road. For those of you who’ve been following this blog since the beginning, you may remember our first ever experiences in this same park back in March. Either way, here’s a quick re-cap.

This time round, Maya was far more adept at side-stepping the copious amounts of cow-poop festooned all around the walkways but what she was less prepared for was the re-introduction of how much attention she can attract. No sooner were we at ‘the rock’ (the centre piece of the park where all the children congregate) than she was overwhelmed by numerous children swooping on her, demanding to her name and ‘which standard she was studying in’. I also felt a little overwhelmed on her behalf and tried, in the politest way possible, to get them to back off a little. It seems I didn’t need to as Maya, studiously ignoring her question-battering, had marched through the crowd and climbed as quickly as she could to the top of the rock for some peace and solitude. Can’t say I blame her. She really has got so much better at dealing with all this attention, but it’s never going to be easy for an independent little three year old.

On the second day, I thought it was unlikely she’d be awake enough for school but, on the contrary, she couldn’t wait to go. Andy reported that she was fought over by a few of the little girls in the playground and her teacher told me that she participated well in every activity throughout the morning except for the running which she point-blank refused to have a go at. I raised an eyebrow and wondered whether it was worth telling her that Maya’s mother went on strike at every single running event throughout primary school and that she may take after me….whilst deliberating this, her teacher said that they’d be running again tomorrow and she was sure Maya would want to join in. Hmm…maybe. But I fear she hasn’t been introduced to Maya’s truly stubborn side yet!

Anyway, I’m pleased to report that Maya seems very pleased to be back here in India. Tearing through the streets in a rickshaw today she kept gleefully yelling ‘Look at that!’ and pointing to bright flowers or stalls being set up on the roadside for the upcoming Diwali celebrations. We even shared a bewildered chuckle at the stocky lady-men in sarees who flicked their long hair and accosted us at the traffic lights for money.

It’s funny to think that when we first arrived here back in March, I was unsure whether Maya would remember much of her time in India. Now, having watched her develop and grow up SO much in the past months, I know I underestimated this. What her memory chooses to filter or remember only time will tell. And who knows, maybe reading this blog twenty years down the line, a description of something will suddenly ignite a flicker of a memory inside her.

ps - photo above taken of Maya today in her favourite napping spot on the cold, hard floor!

Bangalore beckons

2009-10-10T04:39:00.000-07:00

The past two and a half weeks have been a whirlwind of visiting friends and family - in fact, I don't think I've ever seen so many people in such a short space of time before. Maya has loved being re-united with cousins, aunties, uncles, grandparents and old friends as well as meeting a few new babies but let's face it - it was pretty unlikely that this wasn't going to be confusing, not to mention tiring at times. There was, without a shadow of a doubt, a hint of weariness in her voice yesterday when we got into the car for the umpteenth time to reach our next destination. She eyed her parents from the back seat and said 'Where are we going now?' The poor, weary traveller!

Now that we're safely ensconced back at her grandparents house, we can say with all honesty that the next stop is Bangalore. She's been telling lots of people about her friend Aanya and her teacher Paula so I think she'll love being back at her school and being doled out tons of sweeties (grrr...but hey, what kid wouldn't?) She's been eating much better back in England though, so back to beating my head against a brick wall each meal time...and she's also loved being cold! I know I've mentioned this several times before, but our first born is a fair English rose who loves warm jumpers, thick duvets and welly boots. You may well ask what the dickens we're doing dragging her to the steamy climes of India but we realised a long time ago that if our lives were dictated by Maya's wishes then both Andy and I would wear a full pink outfit each and every day and our cupboards would be filled with cupcakes, olives and tins of sweetcorn.

One of the highlights of being back were the not one but TWO violin lessons my sister gave Maya on her own very first violin she started playing herself at the tender age of three. Naturally she showed precocious talent, her auntie declared her a mini virtuoso and she's already booked to play with Nigel Kennedy during his next tour. Ok, the truth? She scraped out a few sweet little scratchy sounds but she had a big old grin on her face and asked for the second lesson herself. She has been raised with her Mama banging about on the piano and both her parents twanging a guitar so I'm sure she'll have some appreciation of music.

We leave in two days time. Back to rude, early morning hocking awakenings (I will never, EVER get used to that), warm days and nights, rickshaws, cows and chickens, the smell of jasmine, rain, spices and drains, Deepa, Aanya and Paula. Maya's been a bit poorly with a cough and cold over the past week so let's hope that the hot air she'll feel at 4am when we exit the airport will blast away the residues of lingering germs. We have love, love, loved being here but we can't wait to go back. Maya has just walked up to my side and asked 'Mummy, what are you doing?' I told her I was writing her blog and asked what she was looking forward to about going back to India. Her reply? The aeroplane. Or 'elloplane' as she calls it. Ah well, it's hardly India. But it's a start!

A couple of wee stories

2009-10-07T06:36:00.000-07:00

This is, I know, very annoying but I'm actually not allowed to say where we might be going next yet as it's not confirmed.....sorreeeee!! I'll let you know as soon as I can.

In the meantime, I'm sure this isn't as exciting as reading about Maya's adventures but here are a couple of my stories that have recently been accepted.

Click on the below link then go to Rebecca Stonehill on the right hand side
http://www.mondaynightlit.com/read/8_allen.html

With this one you'll see my name at the bottom
http://tclj.toasted-cheese.com/

2009-09-28T03:38:00.000-07:00

Maya is in heaven. Back here in Blighty, the world is awash with the golds and greens of early autumn and she is gorging on blackberries she's picked and helping Daddy make sloe gin (!); picking apples straight from the tree in the garden; enjoying the attention from grandparents, uncles and aunts and cousins; she is wearing tights and jumpers with hoods; has easy access to the tv (ugh); is eating sausages, fish fingers, mashed potatoes and baked beans and is snuggling down under a warm duvet at night for the first time in six months.

Maya, I'm sure, feels a long way from India - the land of sun-parched earth and spices, cows, rickshaws and sarees. I know that she is really, really happy to be back here, but that's not to say that she won't be equally happy to go back to Bangalore and be re-united with Aanya, her school and beloved teacher Paula, mayhem on the roads and afternoons filled with ice-cream (every day feels like summer there and it's hardly surprising that Maya's Mama has put on several pounds since being there!) and playing on swings under the shade of a gulmohar tree.

Night times have been difficult, with Maya awake a few times each night in a half-asleep frightened and angry state. We're not sure what's going on there. But whilst we can be as open and honest with Maya as possible, let's face it - maybe there is a degree of confusion about where 'home' is right now. On the whole though, she's doing brilliantly and has also been rising later than her customary 6am, probably because she doesn't need to endure the early morning ritual of the security guard violently hocking outside her bedroom window for about 10 minutes (oh, how I wish I could attach a sound byte so you could hear how truly revolting this is!!).

We're about to leave Maya's grandparents and go a-wandering for several days to visit people. We also have recently received some big news about where we're probably going after India but, like Eastenders cheap cliffhanger tricks, I'll let you know in the next post where adventuring Maya may end up next......

Maya's adventures in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka

2009-09-21T08:27:00.000-07:00

41 hours of rail travel (including 3 overnight trains),
15 sticky oranges,
12 parothas (similar to chapattis but thicker and naughtier),
9 tantrums,
7 days of swimming in the sea,
4 cups of chai,
2 cups of strong coffee,
1 swim under a waterfall,
half a glass of Tom Collins
and about a quarter of a vegetable later...

Maya has made it safe and sound back to Bangalore!

In one day we will be leaving for England for our two and a half week stay, so I don't have time to go into the details of all of Maya's adventures on holiday, but I shall give you some of the highlights!

At the Kings World Trust:

* At the school, Maya joined in with a class of five year olds for a couple of days running, completely unprompted by us. When we were reunited with her, the teacher informed us that Maya even got up in front of the class and sang two songs to them all! Hang on, is this the same child??! When we heard this we were, in a word, flabbergasted!

* Maya enjoyed sweeping the yard with the boys and because of the homely lay out of the boys' village, she would often wander away from the room and we'd find her later with the boys or helping the cook sort vegetables.

* One day, when Andy, Lily and I went for a walk around the town and Maya decided she wanted to stay behind, it seems that she later got scared when she forgot where we were. We were alerted when somebody came out to tell us, turned back towards the boys' village, only to find that one of the staff there had hoisted her onto the front of their motorbike and she was on her way to find us! This is completely normal for India, but we got her down pretty quick smart.

* One afternoon we visited somebody's house where Maya was fed strong, black, sugary coffee. Seriously. When I asked our host if it was normal for children here to drink coffee he said 'Of course!', produced a tumbler for Lily and she glugged it down before I'd had a chance to protest! He told me that coffee is very good for children as it contains so much calcium. Hmmm.... Unsurprisingly, after her second cup Maya was bouncing off the walls and spent the rest of the afternoon and evening dancing, singing and jumping off tables. (See photo above of Maya with her tumbler of coffee and plate of biscuits)

It was wonderful to meet Kings, the boy that Andy sponsors (see photo). He is a wonderful, gentle young lad and we really hope we'll see him again sometime.

At the beach:

Maya turned into a little beach bum. Plastered in factor 50, she braved the waves (amazing to think she was still quite scared of water before coming to India), made castles and holes in the sand, collected marooned starfish and interesting shells and by the end of the week her hair was well and truly dreadlocked like a proper little beach hippy (well, to be fair, all of our hair was). We didn't wear shoes for the entire week and that freedom that I talked about in my posting 'Last child in the woods' that I so crave for Maya could truly be realised at the beach. I had to swim in my clothes which was quite a bizarre experience as the ladies here go into the sea in their sarees. But once I'd got used to that (and having to dodge the occasional fisherman poo on the beach - yuck!), the whole week was seriously relaxing and lovely and we were all horizontal by the end of it. Oh, except for the night that Maya necked half my glass of a Tom Collins cocktail that I'd ordered while I was distracted with Lily. She thought it was juice! We found her later in the bedroom turning round and round in circles singing a jumbled up version of baabaa black sheep - oops!

But now - back to England! Maya is one excited little girl. I'll report back at some stage from the UK how she's getting on with the cold (though I'm sure she'll love it - she's a wellies and woolly hat girl at heart) and the food (request for first meal back: fishfingers and sausages. As I said, she ate all of about a quarter of a vegetable whilst we were away. Hope the girl doesn't get scurvy....)

Goodbye for now but see you soon!

2009-09-03T22:56:00.000-07:00

As a goodbye present, Aanya and Anjali gave Maya the most beautiful traditional Indian outfit which we thought Maya would enjoy wearing to school. She wasn't too keen however because a) it's not pink and b) it's something new and anything different should be viewed with the utmost suspicion in Maya's book. I am ashamed to say that Andy and I enticed her to wear it by promising her cake. I know - bribery in its basest form. But she did look utterly gorgeous (Maya does, unsurprisingly, get camera fatigue sometimes and would only give me a brief grin for this picture but you get the idea of the outfit). I think once she had caught sight of herself in the mirror and twirled a bit, she was quite pleased with the result and even added a sparkly bindi to complete the picture. But after all that, school got cancelled because a government minister died in a helicopter crash. In fact, every school across the state is closed as a result of this which was quite a surprise but it seems he was a well-loved public figure.

However, it turns out that this will not be Maya's final day at school after all because.....

WE'RE COMING BACK!!!!

That's right, after our holiday tomorrow and then 2 weeks back in England, we'll return to Bangalore for another few months as Andy's company have decided they still need him (and they're absolutely right!). We are sooooo delighted. This means a few things:

- That you haven't managed to get rid of me, Maya and this blog after all
- That Maya's head will continue to wobble
- That I have another few months to encourage Maya to try Indian food
- That we're going to be running round like headless chickens, the girls in tow bouncing around in their slings, trying to see as many people as we can in the short time we're back in the UK.

Tomorrow we take the first of 2 overnight trains to head down into the far south of Tamil Nadu. First stop is the King's World Trust, a care home that Andy volunteered at ten years ago and where he has sponsored a child for several years. We've never met Paul (who's now 15) but Andy and he have been exchanging letters for years so this will be a very special experience. After a few days (and my 32nd birthday!) there, we then catch another overnight train (this time it'll be our 4 year wedding anniversary celebrated on the train!) up to the north Karnatakan coast where we'll relax on the beach for a week. Apparently monsoon is still going on a bit over there so we may well be heading back to Bangalore like drowned rats! Between the coast and Bangalore we'll spend our last few nights of holiday at the wonderful Green Hotel in Mysore that we loved so much on our last trip away. Finally, we come back to Bangalore for a couple of days before flying back to England.

I think it's unlikely I'll get a chance to blog while I'm away, but tune back in after the 20th September to hear about Maya's adventures on holiday. If you really want to keep reading my words whilst we're away (yeah, right!) then you could always take a look at my other blog which charts the ebbs and flows of my insomnia, Notes of an insomniac mother. Here it is. It was full of angst in the early days (!) but thankfully there's less of that now.

So, take care all of you, thanks for reading this and lots of love.
Maya, Becks, Andy & Lily
xxx

Maya the threenager

2009-09-02T08:28:00.000-07:00

To get a better look at this photo, click on it to enlarge it. I've talked before about the state of Bangalore's pavements, but honestly, this one just takes the mick. Andy looks despairing and Maya just looks amused. Which is good - at least she wasn't having one of her threenager fits or she may well have hurled herself down this hole. Whoever coined this phrase, 'threenager', hit the nail on the head - admittedly I don't yet know what it's like to have a teenager and I know, I know, teengagers shouldn't be demonised and stereotyped (but come on, generalisations have to come from somewhere!). But whilst Maya is often a lovely, gentle soul, her behaviour of late has resembled what I imagine a stroppy teenager's to be. Here are a few examples, and I'm not exaggerating a single bit:

- Storming off to her room and slamming the door with an almighty bang.

- She has learnt how to operate the laptop and many of it's functions worryingly well. Now, every time I put music on that I want to listen to, it's only a matter of seconds before she marches over and changes it to her music of choice ie Nelly the Elephant and We've got the whole world in our hands. When I say to her that it's my turn to choose the music, she just tutts and says 'No, it isn't.'

- Being so exhausted by her intense partying (or excitement and antics at pre-school I should say) that she will fall asleep anywhere. Even under the desk (see photo two taken yesterday).

- And this is my favourite: If Maya doesn't want to answer a question I've posed to her because it's too probing or annoying she shakes her head and says 'I'm not talking to you.' But Maya, I say, all I'm asking is...'NO' she repeats even louder for the benefit of irritating, slightly deaf mother, 'Did you hear what I said? I'm NOT talking to you.'

Now all I've got to say to that is how very charming.

Homework? Not on yer life

2009-08-30T22:56:00.000-07:00

I've written a little before about my impressions of the education system here, including how much homework kids seem to get from a very young age. But what I wasn't prepared for really was that my own daughter, aged 3 years and 2 months, be sent back with homework! On friday when I went to pick Maya up, I was handed one of her many workbooks and told that she was required to do a few exercises over the weekend. I must have been looking dumbfounded because I think Paula (Maya's beloved teacher who is standing behind her in the photo) must have thought I didn't understand what she was saying and so got out her notebook and showed me the same request, this time written down. To be fair, it was only a matter of colouring in a picture (not of a tree or animal or anything but a computer - that's a sign of the times I suppose!) and also filling out three lines of marking in 'downward lines' in her exercise book...but still. I do feel that giving homework to three year olds is a tad silly. But Maya's only there for another week and I wasn't about to argue with the formidable Paula so I just took the book and off we went.

Over the weekend, an opportunity presented itself for Maya to do this 'homework' as we were sitting at the kitchen table with her book within easy reach. Ah well, I thought, perhaps she'll quite enjoy it since she does seem to love school and will be proud of the sense of achievement at the end of it and all the rest of it....We opened the book up and I explained to Maya what she had to do. She nodded thoughtfully and took up her pen whilst I went into the kitchen to make a drink, thinking that perhaps homework age three wasn't such a bad thing after all. But this is what had happened when I returned to Maya a few moments later:

She'd taken her pen up alright but instead of doing her 'downward lines' (which she does so beautifully at school - I've seen them - unless the teachers do them for her!), she had scribbled all over the page, and the one after that (which was probably meant for this week's homework). Oh, I said to Maya, that's a bit messy. And she just looked at me through her curls with that defiant, stubborn little stare of hers and closed the book in a very definite way. So much for that, I say. But she's off, homework and downward lines forgotten in an instant.

Exclusive Interview

2009-08-28T02:45:00.000-07:00

I am all too aware that sometimes Maya's voice gets lost in all this blogging business, so I think it's high time Maya speaks for herself. Often, she sits in front of the laptop tapping away at the keys and when I ask her what she's doing she casts me one of her well-whaddya-think-I'm-doing looks and says 'I'm writing my blog, Mummy.' So yes, if the little lady could actually write, I'm sure she'd have a very different take on many of the things that feature in her blog. But, since she can't yet write, here's an exclusive, unabridged interview with the girl of the moment!

Please can you tell me your full name?

My name's called Maya Elizabef Narra-COTT

How old are you, Maya?

(Sticks 3 fingers up my nose) Free

Do you like India?

Mmm

Why do you like India?

'Cos my best friend was there.

Who is you best friend?

Aanya. Yes, and Ashiswini and those 2 girls, Anou and Jaya. And Ashiswini. And Aanya.

Do you remember England?

Yes.

Are you excited about going back to England?

Yes.

Who do you want to see in England?

Mummy, let's go on a farm and see that boy.

Which boy?

The one on the farm. The one with the beard.

(Lots of headscratching from Mummy ensues. But we never get to the bottom of this one.)

What will we see in the airplane?

My best friend.

When we get to England, who will we see?

Nannie Liz. (Editor's note: This is her paternal grandmother)

Who else?

Nu-nu. (Ed: her auntie)

Anyone else?

Errrr....Granny Amma and Tata. (Ed: Maternal grandparents)

Anyone else?

(Very impatient look) No Mummy, that's enough people. I'd like to see a picture now.

Can I just ask you a few more questions?

Yes.

Do you remember Godmanchester?

Yes.

What do you remember about it?

No people there.

Is there anything else you'd like to write on your blog now?

Sweetcorn and olives.

What's your favourite food in India?

Dosa and besgetti (Ed: I think she means spaghetti)

What do you like about your school?

Because teacher Paula was there. Is called teacher Paula.

Why is she nice?

Because she's getting fatter and fatter.

Oh. That's not very PC is it?

Huh?

Nevermind. Thanks for your time, Maya.

All the fun of the festival

2009-08-27T01:17:00.000-07:00

I must confess to feeling a little sad today, because if we were in England right now we would, without a shadow of a doubt, be heading to Shambala Festival tomorrow. We've been two years running and it is seriously good fun. English festivals are brilliant because all British reserve and restraint is chucked firmly out the window and festival goers dance, crawl, twirl and waltz, jive, skip, hula-hoop and romp their way through what is essentially a huge field converted into a magical adventure playground filled with music, games, stalls and people dressed in an assortment of weird and wonderful clothing for a few days. So this is just a quick blog to say, we love you India, but we wish we were there Shambala!

The first photo was taken at Shambala '07 and the next three are Shambala '08 with 3 month old Lily attending her second festival (at 2 months she went to Latitude Festival!). Maya loved both her Shambala experiences - highlights were dancing on Daddy's back and swinging in a hammock with the backdrop of an English stately home and ladies in leotards, stockings and wellies. I had a quick look at the Shambala website just to torment myself and see that there are still some tickets going. So if you're at a loose end this weekend, get yourself down there. Immediately. You won't regret it! Here's the website. Failing that, have a quick look at this wonderfully quirky band, Gadjo, we watched perform at the festival last year.

However, before we feel too sad, it's the Ganesha festival going on here at the moment. There are lots of noisy drums and street parties taking place day and night and huge, very brightly painted elephant God statues everywhere you look. Maya likes counting them all as we tear past in rickshaws and now seems just at home saying 'Look!It's the elephant God, Ganesh!' than she was last year around Christmas time when she tore up and down the streets of Cambridge dressed as an angel in mini-evangelist mode calling 'I love baby Jesus!'

Last child in the woods

2009-08-25T01:08:00.000-07:00

Every child comes with a message that God is not yet discouraged by man.

Rabindranath Tagore

Tagore was a Bengali poet, writer, artist and general all-round genius whom I was introduced to last time in India. Yesterday, as we were walking to a park we don't normally go to, we passed a gate on which the above was emblazoned across. What wonderful words. I'm never without pen and paper so wrote them down and as we continued our journey to the park, I thought about them and how right he is that children possess that wonderful ability of pure, unbridled enthusiasm and joyfulness. I know we must not over-romanticise childhood because as a child the world can seem huge and scary and confusing. But what is certain is that, as children, we still have not piled on ourselves (and allowed others to impose on us) the demands and insecurities that characterise our older years.

Anyway, the reason we were going to this new park was because I recently read a review of a book called 'Last Child in the Woods'. It's written by a guy called Richard Louv and sounds fascinating. He's coined the term "nature deficit disorder" to explain how children now spend so little time alone in nature, exploring. In his own words, "In nature, a child finds freedom, fantasy
and privacy: a place distant from the adult world, a separate peace." I know, we've heard it all before, that we don't let our kids out of sight these days, but it's true: we over-parent, over-worry, are over-paranoid and I know evil people out there exist who abduct our children but Louv claims that children today are no more likely to be abducted than they were 30 years ago.

The reason I'm waffling on about this is because, as much as I like many things about Bangalore, sometimes I just heave a great big sigh and would like to be transported to wild, wide, green open spaces so Maya and Lily can run through long grass under vast skies. But hey, right now, it's not possible. So the next best thing is going to a park and I thought it would be fun to try out a new one. I did an activity with Maya where she had to find one thing of about eight different colours in the park. When we'd done this, I started thinking about that book and decided to let Maya and Lily have a little 'wander'. They were funny - they held hands and off they toddled behind a couple of small kids they'd spontaneously befriended whilst I sat on a bench. Every 30 seconds or so, they'd turn round and wave at me and Maya would yell 'We're going on an adventure!' I know it's not the same as being in nature 'proper' BUT Maya seemed genuinely excited and proud of being in charge of Lily, away from her mama and doing her own thing.

So there I was, sitting on the bench and taking a trip down memory lane, reminiscing about my own lucky childhood when I spent countless hours both with my siblings and alone dreaming, imagining and playing in the fields at the bottom of our garden. I don't know how long I was sitting there for before I realised that Maya and Lily had vanished from my sight....so much for 'letting go'! I jumped up and tore off to find them (largely because daughter number 2 has barely been walking for two weeks rather than fear of abduction!). When I rounded the corner, the pair of little devils had already climbed almost to the top of some stone steps on the outside of a small house in the park, Maya helping Lily hoist her chubby legs up from one step to the next.

I look forward to the day when I can really let them explore. I've said this before and I'll say it again: oh, for a plot of land and a cob house and a few fat chickens surrounded by fields!

(ps - the first photo above was taken last weekend, not in Bangalore I hasten to add, but a night we spent away at a farm, and picture two was taken last summer in England.)

Where have all the flowers in Bangalore gone?

2009-08-24T00:12:00.001-07:00

Where have all the flowers in Bangalore gone? Yes, this is a good question, but one that can be answered quite easily. They've gone in Maya's grubby (or sweet-smelling I should say), thieving little mitts. Maya has, like many other children of her age I have no doubt, an obsession with flowers. Trying to walk anywhere takes a very, very long time, not because Maya is a slow walker but because this being the 'garden city', there are lots of flower-filled bushes everywhere. Even on polluted, grimy streets. So here's what happens: we walk a couple of steps and then Maya chirps 'Oooh, hang on, hang on', runs back to pluck a couple of flowers from a bush. Then we start again and maybe manage to move five or six steps this time before she sees a poor little fallen flower on the ground which she thinks needs her loving care and so scoops that one up. Off we go again, but this time she sees another one lying in the gutter and I have to literally restrain her to stop her from climbing down to rescue it. Yup, you get the idea.

To begin with, I found Maya's flower obsession quite sweet. After all, sometimes we do lovely things with the flowers like arrange them into a small bowl with water, as we did this weekend in the picture above. But I have to say that it's all gone a bit over the top now, as Maya wants to pick literally every flower from each stem, bush and tree that we encounter. Andy and I have tried a few different tacks: that the flowers look so lovely on the stem, for everyone to enjoy. Or that actually the poor flowers die quicker once they're picked. She doesn't believe us, and as far as Maya is concerned, every pretty flower in Bangalore (particularly if it's pink) has her name on it. I've lost count of the number of times I've found a foul-smelling, rotting heap of month-old petals hidden at the back of a cupboard or stuffed deep into the pocket of a skirt.

This morning, we went to our favourite Sai Baba temple briefly and it wasn't till after we'd left the temple that I realised Maya had thieved a small rose from the offering table no less. There's an important religious Ganesha festival going on at the moment and this act would, I have no doubt, be met with more than a few raised eyebrows. But we were all strapped back up into sandals again at this point and I didn't much feel like going back to lay the rose on the puja temple so I just gasped, swiftly admonished Maya and we scarpered, my little flower thief cackling in tow.

Aanya

2009-08-22T06:30:00.000-07:00

Now that Lily is tearing all over the place, Maya considers her far more fun and worthy of her attention than she did so previously, even claiming occasionally 'We're best friends!'. But her non-family best friend is most definitely Aanya Gupta. They are in the same class at school and Aanya is a gregarious, mischievous little imp who was passed on to Maya the fantastic Indian head wobble (Maya has now honed this to perfection) which can mean anything from absolutely yes to definitely not to well, I'll think about it. She also acts as a kind of guardian to Maya at school. Even though I don't witness this in the mornings, both Andy and Aanya's mother, Anjali, tell me that every morning in the playground before the bell rings, Aanya covets one slide and if anybody with the exception of Maya tries to go on this slide - woe betide them, they are in for a nasty shock as Aanya pushes them off whilst Maya looks on with feigned coyness before climbing up their personal slide. Honestly.

Occasionally, we all go out for lunch after we've collected the girls from school and whilst both Maya and Aanya love this opportunity to spend more time together, it almost always ends in tears as the two little pixies invariably run riot in the restaurant or cafe or wherever we go, pulling fist-fulls of leaves off pot plants (poor plants), sliding up and down slippery floors till they bang into the wall and playing in front of and behind doors until one or the other gets their fingers trapped. Occasionally, Aanya forgets that Maya can't speak anything other than English and launches into a dramatic account of something in Hindi. Maya gives me a look which reads Eh? What's she on about? and I give her a look back which says No idea whatsoever but let's just nod. Or even better, let's wobble our heads. So the two of us stand there wobbling our heads (Maya does it much better than me) until Anjali comes to the rescue and translates for us.

The two cheeky little girls have only a couple of weeks left to spend in one another's company which is a shame. I know they'll miss one another. But perhaps we'll have the opportunity to come back to Bangalore one day and they'll be reunited. And then, if Maya loses the head wobble (which I'm sure she will), Aanya can re-teach it to her.

My curly-haired lovelies

2009-08-20T01:19:00.000-07:00

Today is World Photography Day. Honestly, it really is. I haven't made it up (I am discovering more and more that there are world days for something or other the entire time, some of them more obscure than others but if there can be a World Laughter Day there can definitely be a World Photography Day!). Anyway, to celebrate WPD I am posting 3 pictures of my lovely curly-haired family (you can't really see Lily's curls in this picture but they're a-comin'! And no, neither of them get their curls from me. Andy has the curls, I have the wavy mop - or 'bird's nest' as a hairdresser once commented). What a treat to be in Bangalore with these three brilliant people. I'm going to echo the words Maya uses when she gets given a treat and say that I am a very lucky girl!

There was a little girl and she had a little curl

2009-08-19T01:52:00.000-07:00

There was a little girl
and she had a little curl
Right in the middle of her forehead
And when she was good she was very very good
But when she was bad she was HORRID!

Old English Nursery Rhyme

(Have I already included this rhyme somewhere in this blog?? Memory? That went out the window with childbirth.) Anyway, the reason I've written this rhyme down is because it must, surely, have been written for my firstborn. I mean, just look at that curl (or curls I should say), and isn't this the face of a lovely little girl.....or not.

Yesterday is a case in point, a day filled with highs and lows, tantrums and tears, loveliness and laughter. Admittedly, this sounds like your average day with a three year old but yesterday was particularly extreme in emotions. Maya was tired, her mama was tired and we were driving each other up the wall. We are also far too similar and sometimes clash like crazy symbols.

Soooo, this is what happened when she was rather horrid. We were in a taxi on our way to the children's library (we go every week, but it's getting a bit silly now as we've taken out every decent book already so are having to go back to the ones we took out at the beginning again!). Maya suddenly noticed that Lily was wearing a few of her pink sparkly bangles (which she put on her little sister herself, but we won't mention that, Maya) and decided she wanted them back. Lily was having none of it, every time Maya reached for her wrist, Lily swiped at her. Maya was not amused and tried another tactic: yelling. I told her that yelling would get her nowhere and tried to ignore both her and the shifty glances of the taxi driver that blatantly read Hey, what's wrong with your kid? Can't you shut her up? No reasoning would work and by the time we got to the library, she climbed out of the car and flung herself to the ground (luckily there was - halleluljah - a pavement outside the children's library so at least this didn't take place on the road) and flailed about like an upside-down ladybird trying to turn itself around for a good five minutes. Every time I approached her to calm her down she tried to kick me. The taxi driver stood outside his vehicle staring at me as much as Maya before asking 'Madam, what is wrong with your daughter?' (What he was really asking was 'what is wrong with you to produce such a child, Madam?) I had no words to answer him so just gave him a withering look before scooping the demented ladybird off from the pavement and frog-marching her into the library. So, yes. Not our finest moment.

But this was her lovely, good moment: We were on the way back from school in the rickshaw and I was asking Maya all the normal questions about how school was and what she'd done etc etc when she suddenly piped up and said to me 'Mummy, when you're a big girl, I will take you to school if you like.' Sweet. But what made it funny was the way she said it....anyone who has a three year old or has had a three year old will know that kids of this age aren't always too articulate, particularly when they're feeling impassioned about what they're saying, which Maya often is. So this was how it came out: 'Mu-mu-mu-mu-mu-mummy, when when when you're when you're when when when when you're (at this point I'm nodding my head up and down like crazy, trying to encourage her to get to the point) a big girl, when when you're you're you're. Mummy. When you're a big girl Mummy, when you're a big girl I I I I.....okay, you get the picture. It was a rather protracted conversation but we got there in the end and when it was all out and expressed, that little curl in the middle of her forehead was positively glowing. Which is just as well, because I was still at that point blissfully unaware of how she'd fulfil the other half of the nursery rhyme prophecy just a few hours later!

The weekenders

2009-08-17T08:15:00.000-07:00

This morning, Maya's school re-opened, but only about twenty kids turned up out of one hundred or so, scared off by swine flu panic. Maya was overjoyed to be reunited with her friend Aanya and probably even more delighted to be dished out with an endless supply of sweeties and chocolates by her teachers. I am so over this one. Honestly. (Do I sound convincing?) I was longing to make a monday morning nose-dive for the laptop to catch up on some of the writing I'd missed out on last week, only to be greeted with a power cut that lasted from 5am-3pm...sigh!

We had a lovely, relaxing weekend. We realised that it was our third to last weekend in Bangalore so decided to visit a few new places. We went to Bangalore Palace, a huge turreted affair modelled on Windsor Castle and owned by the King of Mysore. It was a historical treasure trove but our toothless 'guide' (who demanded a large tip at the end) didn't really speak English and every time we asked him a question he just guffawed and said 'yeeeeees, very very old'. It may be modelled on Windsor Castle, but I don't know if the British Royalty would approve of its hugely kitschy interior (I loved it!) and large number of paintings all over the walls of large-breasted naked women (I say!) and even some lesbian action pictures. Maya kept losing us and skipping off down narrow passageways only to be chased after by Mr.Toothless and found under a picture of two huge breasts before being returned to her family. I tried to take a photo of the palace for Maya's blog but was almost set upon by a baton-wielding guard. When I asked him why I couldn't take a photo he didn't give me an answer. Maybe they just want to keep the fact that the Maharaja of Mysore is an old perve a secret?

We also went for a late afternoon stroll in Cubbon Park, one of Bangalore's two huge parks, this one named after Mark Cubbon, a British resident who was responsible for much of the city's development in the Victorian years. It was Independence Day (or 'Pennance Day' as Maya called it) and fun to see dozens of families and people out and about with their green, white and orange Indian flags and balloons. Maya was thrown into a frenzy of excitement each time she saw either of these as she was counting them all day. When all the attention and cheek pinching all got too much however, she just retreated to the haven of her Daddy's back (picture 3) like she always does!

We also went swimming. It was a lovely warm day and as I've written before, Maya has become a little mermaid (as has Lily) and we can pretty much guarantee she'll be happy when we're at the pool. In fact, we all love it at this particular place, the Jayamahal Palace (picture one), surrounded with beautiful gardens. It struck me, as it often does here, what an amazing life we have here. We are very, very, very lucky and we never forget it. We are living in a country in which children of Maya's age are already helping their parents work. Maya's little friend Ashiswini who plays on the roadside whilst her mother sells food may never even go to school. But what an amazing privelege it is to be here. And when I first started this blog, I wrote that one of the reasons I wanted to do this was because Maya would remember so little of it. But you know what, I think I was wrong. Maya remembers are talks about Godmanchester a great deal and we lived there only up to the age of two. She will remember India. She calls herself an Indian girl, now has a brilliant head wobble and wears bindis and bangles. So yes, Maya will remember India and India will remember her.

Daddy here again

2009-08-15T09:22:00.001-07:00

I can't believe this is only my second post. Maya - when you read this one day - I do apologise but your Mummy is such a good writer and I forget this blog is for you too! She does make me giggle and tells the story so well, but only I can tell you what happens when I go to work.

Sight of the proposed community toilet block on 'lake land'. The school is in the background and the slum out of the picture to the right.

In the last 5 months, I've helped kickstart the process of getting things built; like a community toilet block and mini wastewater treatment plant in a slum for 900 people. This was our first construction contract awarded and has since ground to an abrupt hault when some government officials turned up with sledge hammers one day and started knocking down the temporary site buildings! We could have paid them off, and every other time they came to visit us, but we are an organisation with a clear ethical principles and doing so would fuel the unending cycle of corruption.

The issue of land is a tricky one. Most slums are encroachments into Government land and are never really 'official' because making them so would legally require the Government to provide basic services (ie. drainage, lighting, water, sanitation, waste collection, etc). Many slums are densely packed making it difficult to build things like toilets because there's simply no space. The obvious place for us was next to the school (particularly as the kids have to shit in the open if they need to go during class). But this area is the bed of an old lake, one of the many that were built many moons ago to recharge the groundwater and provide a constant supply of water for the city. But the lake has now dried up (due to rampant development in recent decades that has irreparably changed the character of the watershed) and it would make perfect sense to build a toilet block there. Right now, more than 1000 people a day shit in this area because they have no toilet to use, meaning raw sewage directly entering the small river.

So the case for proper sanitation is an obvious one. But no, there is not one Government agency (and there are 9 who have some responsibility for the lakes) who will give consent for us to do this. So we've had no option but to take it to the courts to try and get a Court Order changed to allow us to build this most basic of services for the people in the slum. The process is slow and involves many meetings with senior officials and politicians. Our Project Manager is leading this task and hopefully she will have some success soon. I hope so - the sight of those school children climbing over rocks and through other people's excrement really makes me angry! It is pitiful that this is accepted and not given the urgency that it deserves by the decision makers who no doubt retain their dignity by using a proper toilet. More to follow....

Auntie Peeper

2009-08-12T21:58:00.000-07:00

I must confess that I am wondering now that Maya's not at school how I used to keep her and Lily amused all day and every day - it feels like quite a long day! We've been doing endless jigsaw puzzles, reams of colouring and lots of visits to the park where Maya zooms round on her scooter and climbs up a big rock and plays with little Ashiswini whilst her mother sells food. It's very sweet because, despite not having one single word in common, Maya and Ashiswini get on brilliantly. They dance, chase each other and chuckle away and Andy and I have even watched them chattering in their two different languages, completely unbothered by the fact they have no idea what the other is saying! Yesterday morning, Ashiswini came over to the apartment for a little while and the three girls zipped themselves up in Lily's travel tent and made mischief.

Older women here are known as 'auntie', and I don't just mean old women, I mean that often when anyone is talking to a woman who is simply older than themselves, they refer to them as Auntie. So a child might call an adult auntie, or an adult might call an older adult auntie. It's very, very common. So this is what I am known as to Ashiswini (it makes sense really, as she'd never remember Rebecca), but imagine my bemusement yesterday in the park when not only Ashiwini staring calling to me 'Auntie! Auntie!' but also Maya! I looked around, thinking Maya was talking to someone else, but no - she was calling me! Since when did I stop being Mummy?? What made it funnier was that Maya had adopted the Indian accent version so it sounded like Unty. At that point I thought that all Maya needs now is the head wobble and she'll be well and truly there. But Andy reported later in the day that Maya DID head wobble in response to something Ashiswini said - damn, I missed it!

Speaking of Indian accents, something else Maya cries out sporadically and makes me laugh each time is Peeeeper! Peeeeper! You are doubtless wondering what this is all about. Well, here's the story: When we first turned up in India, a few times each day we heard somebody walk past the house calling out 'Peeper' with a very nasal, back-of-the-throat type voice. We had no idea what it meant but didn't think too much about it as there is always lots of noise from outside and various hoots, toots, barks and shouts going on. But on one occasion, we were leaving the house as it was being called and saw a man with a bike collecting newspapers. So this was what he was shouting - PAPER! It was a great discovery as we can give all our old newspapers in to be recycled. They even give you money to take your papers away (which we don't accept - they are doing us a favour after all). Anyway, Maya now has her impersonation down-pat and as I said, a few times a day whilst in the middle of lunch or bathtime or something, she suddenly throws back her head and shouts in a little nasal voice 'Peeper! Peeeeeeeper!' Priceless.

Swine Flu

2009-08-11T21:18:00.000-07:00

How quickly things change. I no longer need to worry about what Maya will wear for her Independence Day fancy dress competition on friday because there will be no fancy dress competition. Literally twenty minutes after I'd finished writing Maya's blog the day before yesterday, we received a call from her school to say that they would be closed for the rest of the week (tuesday to friday) as a 'precauation' against swine flu. Yes, swine flu panic has well and truly hit Bangalore and whilst there have been confirmed cases, as far as I'm aware there have been no fatalaties as a result - just a huge amount of confusion.

When I told Maya yesterday morning that she wouldn't be going to shcool, I underestimated her - I thought she'd just assume it was the weekend again come early, but in fact she was well aware that we'd just had a weekend, looked at me highly suspiciously and said in a demanding voice 'Why not?' Hmm...I wasn't quite sure how much detail to go into with a three year old but whilst I was pondering this, she was off, whizzing around the apartment on her scooter (see photo) and didn't seem at all bothered suddenly that she was missing out on school. I know she really enjoys herself at school now, but Maya is aware that there are benefits to staying at home. A large one is that I try to do some writing every day (I'm attempting to get a first draft of my novel completed before we leave India...hmm....) which means Deepa will look after her and Maya has Deepa wrapped around not just her little finger but every finger she has. As soon as I had retreated to my room, no sooner had I closed the door than I heard her saying in her best little I'm-a-hungry-orphan-child-voice saying 'Deeeeee-pa, can I have a biscuit? Actually, two. Can I have two?' Yes, I think Maya will be fine at home.

New friends

2009-08-10T06:21:00.000-07:00

Maya's best friend Aanya is off school for two weeks at the moment, visiting her mother's family in Delhi so Maya's been feeling rather folorn. I know she has other friends at school but the poor love can't remember any of their names (in fact, it's just occurred to me that maybe this has something to do with why Aanya is her 'best friend' - because with the likes of Baijayanthi's and Balasandhya's she plays with, Aanya is the sole name she can pronounce, let alone remember!).

Anyway, the photo above is of a couple of new friends, Anou and Jaya (which she can say - hooray). Their parents are from England but their mother's parents moved over to the UK from the Punjab and since moving to Bangalore just before us, they're feeling very at home being in India. We met them at the Kutteeram hotel a couple of weeks ago and yesterday they had us round to their house for an amazing lunch. Maya was in heaven. Since they're out here permanently, all their bits and bobs came with them from England and Maya spent about 2 hours just sitting in their room, staring open-mouthed at their pink walls, pink duvet covers, pink dolls house and pink doll prams. It all nearly ended in tears when Maya tried to kidnap one of those dolls that sucks their thumbs and whose eyes open and close but in the end she was talked out of it and settled on a purple balloon to match the outfit she'd chosen for herself.

On another note, it's Independence Day on friday and to celebrate this anniversary when the Britts finally let India come in to its own, there is a fancy dress competition at Maya's school. She has to wear something that celebrates Indian culture. Maya is completely obsessed with her purple skirt at the moment and has screamed so heartily the past few days when I've suggested she wears something else that I've just given in and let her wear the darn thing! Any ideas on how I can get her to participate dare I say it?!

A wee story

2009-08-08T20:01:00.000-07:00

A very short short story of mine has just been published on a poetry and prose webzine called Ink, Sweat & Tears (it was written as a result of an exercise we were given in a creative writing class in Cambridge last year.) Click here if you feel like having a quick ganders.

A few photos

2009-08-07T19:41:00.000-07:00

Andy commented the other day that whilst I have a ton of photos of Maya on this blog, there are barely any photos of anything else. This is true. Although I absolutely love taking photos, when I'm out and about, I'm always with Maya and Lily and can't really take pictures 1) for fear of directing too much attention towards whatever I'm taking the picture of and Maya going AWOL and 2) because I have Lily in the sling in front of me and on numerous occasions I've clunked her poor little head with my hefty Canon camera!

I have managed to take hundreds of pictures since being here, but looking through them realise that the vast majority are of my family and it's not at all obvious from them we're in India! So I've chosen just a few in which I hope bring out a teencey weencey bit of the colour and fabric of this amazing country.

First Steps

2009-08-05T21:48:00.001-07:00

STOP PRESS - Lily is walking!!! (She is also looking rather strange at the moment after Deepa attacked her eyebrows with an eyeliner pencil as you might notice from the photo, but we won't dwell on that...)

She only started two days ago but is already zooming quite confidently (albeit unsteadily) around and is one happy little baby. She'll be giving her big sister a run for her money soon.

Colour Strike

2009-08-04T22:31:00.000-07:00

This week and last week at Maya's school, the children have been asked to go in wearing a different colour each day to help them get a handle on the colours. Now theoretically, this is a great idea, if your child agrees to it. Which Maya doesn't. It all started off quite well with Maya decked out in green on one day, dark blue on another....but then on about day 4 Maya went on strike. No explanation. She just simply will not 'play ball' and she is soooo stubborn. (I have no idea where she gets it from). We're not going to force the child into clothes she doesn't want to wear, but it's funny seeing all the other kids in yellow or orange or light blue and Maya...well, Maya simply not subscribing.

Yesterday was orange day and, like every day now, she's having none of it. Arguably her hair colour would have sufficed anyway, but by the end of the morning, I'd convinced her to don an orange hair scarf. Sulkily, she relented, but by the time Andy had reached the school with her and she'd seen all the other little tangerine flavoured kids, she'd pulled it defiantly off. Will she be a contrary child, I wonder? Or is this more to do with the fact she's obsessed with pink?

Maya, Maya quite contrary
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells and cockle shells
and pretty pink crayons / felt-tips / t-shirts / pants / hair clips / ice-cream all in a row.

I am a ballerina (with crazy curls)

2009-08-02T07:32:00.001-07:00

I think I've talked about Maya's love of dancing several times over the course of this blog. But I'd like to recount a little tale to you about last night's happenings. Maya often announces these days the words I am a ballerina! This is generally followed by a brilliant little twirl or pirouette, wild curls flying, with the panache that only a three year old can muster. After her disinterest in the Bollywood dance class, I've thought that for the time being, she is happier either dancing to her heart's content at home or going to watch others performing.

I read in the paper that a local cultural centre had an evening classical dance performance. Phoning up to check the directions from a friend, she said that children were not permitted in the auditorium, so Lily and Andy had to stay behind but I thought that Maya and I would give it a whirl anyway. We turned up and not only were there large, ominous signs on the door saying NO CHILDREN UNDER TEN ALLOWED but the man selling the tickets shook his head very firmly and said it was out of the question that Maya be permitted entrance to the show. Oh, pleeeease I begged. He shook his head once more and said that there was nothing he could do. I'd been preparing Maya the whole way there in the rickshaw about how wonderful it would be and felt pretty bad about it.

Maya got the wrong end of the stick and thought the problem was that there was only one ticket left so she said to the man Don't worry, we can share! Bless her. I sighed and explained to Maya that children under ten couldn't go in. But I'm a big girl! she protested. I thought I'd give it one more shot. Please, I begged the ticket seller. She loves dance so much. And she'll be very, very good and quiet. The man loooked at me, then he looked at Maya. And Maya shot him one of her best little oh, go on cheeky grins (much like the one in the picture above, which is why I've included it). At this stage, the man looked around him shiftily then said whispered conspiratorially, Ok, get in there quick! But sit at the back, and the second she makes a noise, out you come. We darted in before he could change his mind. And Maya did indeed love it. We only stayed for an hour of the two hour show. For forty five minutes of that she was transfixed by the stunning costumes and graceful movements of the dancers. In the final fifteen minutes she started getting tired and fidgety and I decided that enough was enough when she got folded up in her seat - you know those seats you get in cinemas that you have to push down - well, these ones were extra heavy, presumably because they never have little under-ten-year-old bottoms sitting on them, so I'd been holding it down for her but had got distracted by the performance and up she shot, legs now up by her ears. Maya found this hilarious but I didn't want to risk the wrath of the organisers or get the ticket-seller in trouble so we nipped out as quietly as we could.

So yes, a successful night out and now Maya has a few more moves in her dance repetoire.

Brains of India

2009-07-30T19:57:00.000-07:00

Something I have noticed here is that school is taken very, very seriously, even for three year olds. I'm not mocking this - education is more than vital, it's a fundamental right. But I'm just surprised at how early they get the kids going here. I can't claim to know much about India's educational system or job market, but what is apparent is that positions here are very, very competitive and whilst the recession may not have hit India as hard as many other countries, unemployment here is still a big problem. Deepa's husband speaks six languages for goodness sake - six - and he cannot find a job after being made redundant from his IT firm. He has been searching for six months now and is prepared to take absolutely anything. The point I'm making is that education - and a good education - is more important than ever here. Everywhere we go we see centres for children claiming to help hone childrens memories and turn them into little geniuses. School is attended six days a week and even extremely young children are given a ton of homework. I'm always shocked at the weight of the huge school bags I see tiny tots struggling under on their way home from school. What's more, India is about to hit the billion population mark and there aren't enough jobs to go round, that's for sure.

So I suppose I shouldn't be all that surprised when the first question often asked of Maya is Where are you studying? Or Which standard (class) are you studying in? Maya is flummoxed by this question and more often than not ignores it. All she cares about as far as school goes is she gets given chocolates there so it really must be a good place to go. But yesterday all the parents at Maya's school (this is what everyone calls it but in English terms it's really just a nursery) were given a huge bag of books that we're required to cover over the weekend. Flicking through the books I was really surprised to see that as of next week, amongst other things she'll be doing some quite tricky maths and writing. She's only just three!! Maybe this is what she'd be doing at nursery back in the UK - but I think not. I wonder what she'll make of it all. She's a bookworm already but as for taking to maths exercises - well, the proof will be in the pudding but I dearly hope she inherits her father's genes when it comes to arithmetic rather than her mother's otherwise the poor girl is destined to be forever a mathematical dunce.

Lily gets attitude

2009-07-29T00:55:00.001-07:00

From the pictures, this may look like a cherubic, blue-eyed babe with not a grumpy bone in her chubby little body. Do NOT let her kid you. Lily has, since my last posting about her, got feisty. In a big way. Here are a couple of examples:

- When we went to the park last week, a group of elderly ladies gathered around Lily, all cooing and clucking over her. (She has often been likened to a Barbie doll but yeeeeuuk I say to that.) Lily put on her best 'I am not impressed face (she has honed this to perfection: brows knitted and lowered and bottom lip puckered.) One of the ladies then made the mistake of trying to stroke her cheek and the sound that came out of Lily can only be described as a snarl. And this was accompanied by her little fist swiping out in much the same way that a cat does with their claw if they are irritated. The elderly ladies all sprang back in surprise with their arms outstretched in surrender pose and expressions reading Whoaaa! Calm down, now! We won't come near you again - promise! So yes, Lily is asserting her independence and clause no.23 in Lily's Personal Human Rights declaration reads 'The right to not have my space invaded. Even if it's an old lady who just wants to stroke my cheek. My cheek is not public property thank you very much.'

- When I am tap-tapping away in the morning, doing my writing and Lily is being looked after by Deepa, I often hear little outbursts coming from next door. There is quite a lot of screaming and protesting going on, but I have learnt now that this is normally not as a result of having a nasty fall or hurting herself, it's more likely to be because Deepa does something that Lily doesnt like eg take a pen out of her hand that she's trying to stab herself with or take the packet of cumin powder from her hands that Lily is trying to douse herself with. This little lady just does not like being told 'no'. Ok, it's no different from any other child her age, I'm sure, but it seems that in the blink of an eye, Lily went from the most laid-back little girl imaginable to a feisty madam! Deepa is pretty much unflappable, but often when I come out of my room to relieve her, she laughs despairingly that Lily is a changed baby from the one she first started looking after or, in Deepa's words, 'she's a naughty girl now.'

Speaking of Deepa, you can see from pictures one and two that Lily has a dab of red powder on her forehead. Whilst I am writing and Maya is at school, aswell as being chased round the apartment by an uncomplaining ayah, Lily is also attending the Deepa beauty parlour. Several times, Lily has been returned to me with her hair slicked sleekly into hair clips and bunches with coconut oil, her finger and toe nails painted pink and be-decked with every imaginable bangle, anklet and neclace. She is a sight to behold.

As for walking, because she's been crawling for a long time now, I thought she'd want to get going on her legs. But she feels safer closer to the ground and does plenty of finger walking with us. She is barely holding on and when we try and put something else in her finger that might feel like a finger (?!) she will not be fooled and instantly howls. I suppose one of those baby walker's would help but because we've got less than 2 months left here (I know, where has the time gone??), I'm loath to buy one.

Having commented how feisty Lily now is, I have to complete this by saying that she is also truly adorable - fun loving, very very cheeky and brave (she hurls herself down slides with wild abandon without a second thought) and also very funny. When we get home and leave our shoes by the door, she takes them, one by one to the cupboard and arranges them neatly in there as if to say come on people, stop being so slovenly! She also seeks out her pink sunhat whenever we're at home because she likes to have it on at all times, even when she's as naked as the day she was born. Lily loves water, music, hiding from us and playing peekaboo, food, going for walks in the sling and being thrown up and down in the air to Maya's favourite 'jumping song' (see last weeks blog). I think we're going to have to watch this one... feisty she may be, but she is also a squidgy little bundle of pure fun and delight.

The Dress

2009-07-28T03:15:00.000-07:00

In a blog the other day, I talked about one of Maya's favourite dresses being repaired and given to a little girl who spends the day with her mother selling food to passers-by at the end of our road. We've since discovered that the girl's name is Ashiswini, and here'a a photo of her above taken wearing it. It's actually done well this dress, as it was also well worn by Maya's older cousin Daisy. Ashiswini's mother, Lakshmi, has constructed a very simple swing out of a sari, hanging from a tree so that she can both play and sleep in it. People here never fail to amaze me how resilient they are, making the best out of situations that I know in England we just wouldn't begin to know how to deal with.

Kutteeram & kidnapping to King George's Palace

2009-07-26T07:19:00.000-07:00

Both Andy and I have been feeling the need for the sea recently, so we had a great plan to head to the Tamil Nadu coast for the weekend, which many people do from Bangalore. However, after we studied our plan in more depth, we realised that most of these people surely can't have kids - it would have involved about eight hours of travelling to reach our destination! Instead, we whisked Maya out of school on friday and in the morning travelled a mere hour and a half out of Bangalore to a beautiful hotel called Taj Kutteeram we'd heard about.

It was beautiful there - several individually designed cottages made from adove, tribal art painted on the walls, mosaic floored bathrooms and our own swing chair out the back. Another great bonus was that there was lots of garden space for Maya to run and Lily to crawl, plus a pond replete with ducks which I don't think Maya had really come into contact with much since our Godmanchester days and gleefully watched them from the bridge jumping into the water and screeching 'plop!' each time one had gone in.

On our first full day there, we decided to go on a morning walk to Hessarghatta Lake which we'd read about. This was where villagers once washed clothes and brought their sheep and cattle to drink. It was also home to the Bangalore Yacht Club, so when we reached the lake, we were shocked to see that it was dry as a bone. This was a stark reminder for us of the drought that India is facing and the very real effects of climate change. We were told that the lake has been dry for some time now and we watched as villagers herded past with their animals, all headed for a very small patch of water in the middle of the dried out mud flat. We sat on the banks of what was once the resevoir (picture 3) whilst Maya and Lily watched her parents trying to get the kite going and also the villagers go by. Where's the water, Maya asked, since we'd told her we were going to a lake. How to explain drought and global warming to a three year old? It was very sobering. I found this photo on the Guardian weekly website. This image speaks a thousand words about the situation that I cannot. Click here

Just to bring this home to an even greater degree, we then had a peculiar experience. We were all feeling quite tired and weren't that keen to walk back to the hotel so decided to hitch. It didn't take long before we were picked up in a jeep by three wealthy Bangaloreans: a man, his sister in law and his nephew who fed us plum cake and insisted we accompany them to visit their friend who lived on a farm. We said we thought we'd better get back for lunch but they kept driving anyway whilst the patriarch (who had an incredibly hoarse voice, probably because he shouts rather than talks) regaled us with stories of his friend, 'King George' whose farm we would now be visiting. Before we knew it, we were hurtling along a driveway after being cleared by the security guards at the gate and found ourselves at an enormous mansion with vintage cars, race horses and perfectly manicured lawns. It transpired that King George wasn't there but we were given a tour anyway of the house. The man took a liking to Maya who he called May-aaaar and kept trying to bounce her curls but the feeling wasn't mutual and she did a quick hop, skip and a jump every time he approached her.

The house was, in a word, obscene. The owners are from Bangalore and come to the house every other weekend, if that. Despite that, water is sprayed generously over the lawns to keep the grass green and springy, the enormous swimming pool is full and gleaming and staff move like ghosts about the empty mansion polishing the mahogany furniture and scrubbing the marble floors. King George is clearly an egomaniac as there are pictures of him everywhere AND (I shudder to write this), not only were there stuffed animal heads adorning many of the walls, but there was also a real elephant foot which had been turned into a side table and an elephant trunk in a hallway as decoration. Andy saw it first and hoped that neither Maya or I would spot it. Thankfully I don't think Maya realised what it was but I was so outraged by what I'd seen that I just could not help but say something. I tried to keep my voice as neutral as possible and as the old guy kept saying 'Isn't this an amazing house? Isn't it beautiful?', I intervened and said 'Yes, but it's not that nice having dead elephants in it.' He stopped walking, looked round at me in surprise and laughed 'That's not a dead elephant! It's just the trunk!' Oh. Right. Stupid me.

At this stage we were keen to get out of there, but we were first given a drink on the terrace before we got back in the jeep to be taken back to the hotel. 'This,' the patriarch announced proudly, 'is India.' Erm, no offence, I know we've only been here four months but frankly, this is bloody well NOT India. This is how 0.000001% of the Indian population live. Go and look at the dried up reservoir and the villagers taking their cattle to a meagre scrap of water. This is how millions are living. So yes, point made. King George's palace was good to see, and I know they were just being kind by taking us there. But they wanted us to be impressed and I felt far more sickened than anything else.

The following day we visited the Nrityagram Dance Village, right next to the hotel. Sunday is the day when local kids are given lessons by professional dancers. It was fascinating to watch and Maya, who now frequently refers to herself as a dancer, could not tear her eyes away from the class. She also made friends with a couple of English girls (first Brits we've met!) who were staying at the hotel too with their parents, and the three of them tore around the grounds making mischief. We're now back in Bangalore and we have two very tired little girls tucked up in bed, Maya probably still swinging in her sleep from the motion of the gently rocking swing chair and the hammock she spent so much time in.

Cafe Culture

2009-07-22T21:38:00.000-07:00

Maya thinks that life begins and ends in a cafe. She truly does. Often, when I ask her in the afternoon what she'd like to do today, she pipes excitedly 'Go to a cafe!' I frown and wonder where on earth she got this from. It can't have anything to do with the fact that both her parents are tea and cake addicts (their second date was spent in a cafe in Antigua Guatemala stuffing their faces with cheesecake) and that we often pause for pit-stops for 'the sake of the children'. This was all very well when it was boiling hot, because the cafe's often provided cool respite for sweaty Family Narracott. But it's not hot at all now, it's simply habit!

Maya is very astute. She knows that if we go to a cafe, her parents cannot resist satiating their sweet tooth and we can hardly indulge in cake without giving our children hearty slices too. Even though Maya picked up her love of sitting down with a cup of tea (or chai as we do here) and a piece of cake from her parents, I must confess that I do slightly flinch each time she announces her desire to go to a cafe since this is a pretty extravagant pastime, particularly in a country like India. And the trouble is now that the little lady expects cake. If I suggest a biscuit instead she gives me a look like a wounded deer and I have such a personal weakness for it that I normally relent! I think a greater deal of self-control is required, or else our family will return to the UK with an addiction to doughnuts and prematurely thickening waistlines.

Jumping over paper planes with bangles on

2009-07-21T01:51:00.001-07:00

Maya is into bangles in a big way right now. And obviously this is a good place to be into bangles, because the markets are full of them in all shapes, sizes, textures and colours. I bought a packet of gold and pink ones for her recently but rather than mix them all up, she likes wearing the pink ones on one wrist and the gold on another. Very organised is our Maya.

The second photo was taken when Maya was just a few months old, out for a walk in the sling wearing mini-sized bangles sent over by a friend in India and the third picture was taken at ten months where she's experimenting with them on her ankles and in her mouth! It's clear to see from picture two that Maya's mama is also quite partial to bangles and it seems that now both of us enjoy the tinkling, jangling sound they make when we move.

The other thing that Maya has suddenly taken to is....jumping! I remember a lovely kindergarten teacher I met at a wedding last summer telling me that when little people start jumping, it is a BIG deal for them. The transition from hopping to jumping is huge and that feeling of both feet leaving the floor at the same time is nothing short of exhilarating. It's funny isn't it - something we take so for granted. But seeing how excited Maya gets when she jumps, I can well believe this. There is a song she adores called Paper Planes - it comes from Slumdog Millionaire and whether or not you liked the movie, you have to admit it's a catchy song and something about it just makes you want to get up and jump! So that's exactly what we've been doing (the neighbours must seriously wonder about us...) and Maya has renamed it The Jumping Song! Curious? Listen to it here

Whatever Next

2009-07-19T22:13:00.000-07:00

Right, I've seen some things in my time but yesterday afternoon definitely features high on my 'Bizarre Weekend Activities' list. And Maya's too, I have no doubt. Let me explain. Andy recently told me about a group called the Hash House Harriers. It is a global organisation and in practically every city in the world, groups of ex-pats convene on alternate sunday afternoons to either run or walk along a trail that has been discovered by a member of the group and is different every time. This always takes place out of the city in the surrounding countryside for a nominal participation fee. Now theoretically this sounded alright as it doesn't take much for me to be convinced I need to get out of the city. I was less certain, however, about darting through paddy fields after some posh, triple-barreled-surname British ex-pat wearing lycra. However, off we went in the taxi and after the Bangalore suburbs had dropped away to reveal swaying palm trees and lush green fields, I was definitely up for a good walk. There were about twenty-five of us, a mixture of ex-pats and local Bangaloreans and everyone was very friendly and welcoming.

Maya was asleep by the time we arrived so we quickly transferred her from the car to Andy's back in the sling where she continued sleeping for a little while, but she soon woke up and enjoyed picking flowers from Andy's back, pointing out oxen with long horns and also spotting the white chalked signs along the way that marked our trail. It was at this point that I became aware that the Hash House Harriers weren't your average walking / running group: this marking system is designed to throw participants off the correct trail and on in the wrong direction. When you reach a certain symbol, there are various ways you can go and you have to try them all out until you've spotted a white arrow which then determines you're on the right path. If there's no arrow, then back you go and you have to try the next trail! Okay, I have a sense of humour. I can see the fun in that (I think?), but with a babe on one's back, I'm not sure how many times I'd be prepared to go shooting off down the wrong trail before giving up on the expedition and declaring the whole bunch of them crazy loons. Thankfully, one of the organisers kept giving the sole family group a nudge nudge wink wink in the right direction. We were even guided round an almost vertical hill rather than over it. Phew.

Speaking of this particular organiser, he was carrying a large claxon (you can see it in his hand in photo 1 above), another peculiar element of every HHH as it was constantly honked as we walked round. Quite functional I suppose to prevent people from losing the trail (even though they blatantly encouraged people to lose this very trail), but honestly, can you imagine a stranger sight for the local villagers: A load of half-running, half-walking people tearing through fields and along paths and then reversing back down the same path, many of them dressed in lycra (so yes, my suspicions were confirmed on this front) and two of them carrying small children on their back, one little girl even tied on with a sari for goodness sake. Yes, there is no doubt about it. We must have looked like a load of nutters.

For a person that loves taking photographs and stopping to chat with locals, I quickly learnt that this just wasn't possible with the HHH (though I did manage to sneak a quick pic with some beautiful girls in one of the villages - see picture 2). The pace is rapid so it's very good exercise and after a brief stop half way round for watermelon and cold water, Maya and Lily were still in good spirits so we decided to continue rather than return with the beer van. Beer van you're asking? Yes. Beer van. Upon completion of our 8km circuit, we were handed out ice cold beer and samosas which was fantastic. See picture 3 above which shows how happy I was about this. But it became rapidly apparent that of equal importance to the HHH is its title as drinking club and soon, things got downright weird. We stood in a circle and announcements were read out to members who all have nicknames such as 'Bottom sniffer' and 'The Illiterate' and then an enormous block of ice was produced from the beer van on which the HHH's in turn started to park their behinds on and then down beer from plastic urine bottles. Yes, really. The HHH song was sung, as was Swing Low Sweet Chariot and I realised that what I was witnessing was a load of overgrown university students, yearning for the drinking clubs of their student days (Andy's laughing at me for being stuffy, but I only heave a big sigh of relief for having left those 10 pints a night well behind me!)

Maya was fascinated by the ice and started licking it and just when I was thinking how hilarious this all was, the 'novices' were then called upon to sit on it. I protested, saying that I was holding Maya, but was assured that the bottoms of the 'Hash Horrors' (as the kids are known) wouldn't suffer at all as they could sit on our laps. Oh. Right. So Maya sat on my lap and Lily on Andy's and let me tell you, sitting on a big block of ice for a long time is damn chilly. We duly drank out beer out of the urine bottle but then things went from weird to weirder as it was decided that I was not drinking mine fast enough and the remaining contents of my bottle were tipped over my head. Let me repeat - ON MY HEAD. So by this point I had a cold, wet bum and head, shirt and jeans covered in Kingfisher Beer. Maya was staring at everyone in the group like the whole world had gone beserk and frankly, I couldn't have agreed more.

The locals who had witnessed this group of people descend on their normally peaceful spot, go off for a run and then return and pour beer over one another thought this all looked like great fun and joined in sitting on the ice block and drinking out of urine bottles (see photo 5).

On the way back in the taxi my hair was standing up in stiff points from dried, smelly beer and my jeans (why did I wear jeans??) were unpleasantly damp. But Maya and Lily spent the entire hour journey on the way back laughing, whether with me or at me is unclear. Would we go next time? Ask me again once I've got the beer out of my hair. What IS clear is the Hash House Harriers are bonkers.

The Art of Sharing (or not)

2009-07-18T07:18:00.000-07:00

Last week, a beautiful young woman and her small daughter appeared at the end of our street selling food to rickshaw drivers and passers-by out of large stainless steel tupperware. Because both she and her daughter were interested in Maya and Lily, we started to talk a little each time we went by, she in her stilted English and me attempting a few words in my appauling Kannada. The child is older than Maya, though she looks far younger but she is a gorgeous little girl with a big smile and boundless energy and she plays patiently by the roadside for the entire day whilst her mother sells food.

A couple of days ago, I was asked if we had any clothes we could give her daughter and I rummaged through Maya's cupboard and found a few things. One item was a dress that had been badly wripped, so I took it to the tailor to get it mended. Because the tailors here are so amazing, it looked as good as new when it was returned to me. The dress had been a favourite of Maya's, so when I told Maya initially we were going to give the dress to the little girl, that was fine. But now that it was restored to its former glory, this posed more of a problem. When we went to hand it over, I could see Maya really thinking about it, remembering how much she loved this dress. But then she looked at me, looked at the little girl and gave it to her. I was really, really proud of her. But for fear of sounding like a sanctimonious 'oh-yes-my -daughter-is-so-kind-considerate-and-emotionally-advanced-child' kind of parent, when we got home, she promptly threw a huge tantrum because she didn't want to share something with Lily, kicking out at her sister so violently that Lily actually sank her little teeth into her. So yes, it's all swings and roundabouts!

The photo is not actually of this little girl but a child called Malama who lives on the other side of the park and Maya has given her nail varnish, a pineapple and a school bag. In return, Malama festoons Maya with flowers plucked from the bushes.

Blatant bit of self-publicity

2009-07-16T01:35:00.000-07:00

I know, I know, I have a habit of elbowing my way into Maya's blog from time to time for a moan or a blatant bit of self-publicity. I've just asked the little lady if it's okay and she eyed me suspiciously but has agreed.

My article on 'Dealing with Insomnia' has just come out in The Green Parent magazine. Hopefully none of you have it so won't really need to read it, but just in case you're in a newsagents, you might like to have a quick flick. Click here to see the front cover so you know it if you spot it.

Also, have you ever googled yourselves?? It sounds like a highly ego-maniacal activity but yields most bizarre results. Actually, it was Andy that googled me the other day (yeah yeah you're saying) and it was a bit of a shock to see stories I've written up there which I have NO recollection of submitting! Ah well, I don't mind. It could well have been one of those long nights of insomnia that I'm on another planet and went on a story submitting frenzy. I don't blame you for a second if you feel like you read enoough of my words, but if you ever have the misfortune of sitting up late into the night, not being able to sleep you may like to look at these two stories. Click here to see London to Ladakh which is a true story and here for The Luncheon which is a figment of my warped imagination.

ps - Picture above - very random I know, but my latest thing is taking photos of peeling film posters. People think I am - in a word - nuts.

Where's the power?

2009-07-14T22:30:00.000-07:00

Having written just a short while ago how pleased we were that the monsoon had finally put in an appearance, I may have been a little hasty as it's now gone on strike again. This really is bad news for thousands of farmers and all the people who rely on this yearly deluge of rainfall to water their crops. It's also bad news for the reservoirs that are normally filled with water which then power the wind turbines to give us electricity, which means electricity is in very short supply. We are getting on average about three power cuts a day, lasting anywhere from half an hour to three hours.

To begin with, Maya found the power cuts quite entertaining. Thankfully (?) she'd been educated by a little pink cartoon pig called Peppa Pig on what power cuts were so when they began, she threw herself into the torch and candle hunting game with gusto. And Andy and I enjoyed it too. We'd reach for the guitar (see above!), have a candlelit dinner and really talk. Yes, that old-fashioned pastime. But then came the more irritating part of it: the freezer defrosts and leaves puddles on the floor which Maya and Lily skid about on, the food goes off, the washing machine stops mid-cycle and leaves a heap of half-washed nappies in the drum that smell so bad that Maya walks into her room, announces 'PONGY!' and makes a swift exit. What else...I often can't do my writing in the mornings (I know, I know, out with the violins) and I had a yoga class last night in pitch black. Which was surreal. These small things are nothing, nothing in comparison to the plight of the poor farmers, but still, on a day to day basis it can be a little awkward.

As far as Maya is concerned, the power cuts are now a downright inconvenience and she couldn't care less if Peppa Pig finds them fun. The reason for this is because the laptop only hangs on for so long without power before giving up the ghost and if this comes in the middle of watching one of her beloved DVD's, the fit she throws is quite spectacular. We've tried explaining to her that it's beyond our abilities to bring it back but frankly, she doesn't believe us and thinks it's some plot to get her to watch less TV. Sigh. What can a parent do? Having said this, if the power goes off at a more fortuitous moment when she's nowhere near the laptop, Maya is sometimes more enthusiastic about them and runs off to fetch the candles. She now regularly does this whether it's dark or not. Yesterday for example, she made us sit and eat lunch by candlelight with the bright sunshine pouring in through the window!

So, could you do a little rain dance for us? Otherwise we'll have the pong of half-washed nappies forever lodged up our noses and I may well give myself a black eye trying to do sun salutations in the dark. Ta.

Taking to the streets

2009-07-12T07:16:00.000-07:00

As you already know, we like walking. Oh yes. So when we heard about the 3 hour long 'Bangalore Walks' we just could not resist, even if it meant a 6am start (nothing new there anyway) and a possibility of tired, grumpy children if we did not bring enough 'diversion' snacks to post into their mouths at frequent intervals.

We opted for the 'Victorian Bangalore Walk', run by a very knowledgeable guy called Arun who succeeded in transforming the building site that central Bangalore has become to a quiet little Victorian cantonment town full of sedate bungalows with sprawling gardens , churches, lakes and British military. We learnt all kinds of interesting things such as the young Winston Churchill having lived there for 3 years where he read voraciously, tended his roses, played polo and never paid his bill at the prestigious Bangalore Club. We also felt very sorry for poor Mr Dobbie who came a-cropper with a tiger and is now commemorated on the walls of Holy Trinity Church. There definitely aren't enough wild tigers around these days to do much harm to the public; what we had to be far more wary of on our walk were cars and crazy drivers. Oh, if only they'd tread the same path to extinction as the poor tigers, then Bangalore would be far more pleasant!

Maya did brilliantly on the walk. When she was dragged out of bed at 6am she kept asking sleepily 'Where's our going?' When we replied we were going on an adventure, she seemed reasonably satisfied with that.It was a long morning for her, but she partly walked, was partly carried and thankfully, just as we'd run out of snacks and she'd decided that she'd really had enough, we took a break and the discerning Arun re-fuelled us all with biscuits and mango juice.

The walk ended with a delicious breakfast on the top floor of a high building with fantastic views of the city. Though I'm constantly lamenting the loss of Bangalore's trees, one can see from this height that it is, in fact, still a very green city and still just about deserving of its claim as 'the garden city.' Whilst we were having breakfast, another of the walkers asked me if we found it difficult feeding the girls in India. I said that whereas Lily liked food that was a bit spicy, Maya refused to go near it. She overheard me and in protestation said loudly , 'I do like spicy food!' 'You do?' I asked. And in reply, she popped a large bit of idly (steamed rice cake) covered in spicey coconut chutney in her mouth. Perhaps this reverse psychology is the way forward!

Muddling through in the Monsoon

2009-07-09T22:42:00.000-07:00

I don't have any photos of the monsoon yet. When I do I'll be sure to post them up. But for those of you who read my blog last week about the difficulties often presented by the pavement, I thought this photo provided a good example of this. This little boy has just stopped and is thinking what I often think when we come to a similar 'drop': what now??! The answer is, of course, go on the road. But now you see why pushchairs are just not an option here.

But back to the monsoon...I've lost count of the number of times we've been caught out by it recently. The other day Andy found Maya, Lily and I dripping wet under a tree after a hasty exodus from the park. I was in mid-spiel to Maya at the time, telling her how I really must stop talking about getting an umbrella and actually get one. It is very, very good that the monsoon seems to be finally kicking in. It's good news for the farmers, good news for the reservoirs and good news for the parched earth. It's also good news for the umbrella sellers, but these elusive people are much like buses: you wait for an eternity for one to turn up and then two come at the same time. I just couldn't find an umbrella when I needed it but then came across a street in which there were several sellers.

Maya put in a request for a pink one, but the only colour they came in was black. She was most unimpressed. But I want a pink one! she hollered. I eyed the strengthening rain and she was overruled, much to her disdain. However, once back outside Maya decided that any umbrella was quite a fun novelty. Have you ever walked behind a small child dwarfed under a huge umbrella, zig-zagging precariously along? Well, that is what Maya was doing yesterday, but throw the above 'pavement-pause' scenario into the equation and let's just say that it's not the safest journey in the world. If you look at the photo again and this time imagine that the little boy is staring down at a huge black umbrella which has got itself lodged in the pavement gap and a little curly-haired child is shouting back up 'Oops! Mummy! Can you get me out?' If your powers of imagination have served you well then you can imagine my concern at Maya walking along under the umbrella! She was not happy when I took the umbrella off her and hoisted her hood up instead (mental note to myself: must keep her raincoat on us at all times) but as much as she'd probably disagree, I'd rather she got wet than did a vanishing act into the pavement.

Shananigans

2009-07-07T22:10:00.000-07:00

On the way home in the rickshaw yesterday, I asked Maya what she had done at school. 'Fackin' she replied with a face as straight as her hair is curly. Although she had no intention of saying the word that is so closely resembled, I must confess it came as a bit of a surprise to hear this sound coming from her lips. Sorry, I said, What was that? And again, she replied enthusiastically, Fackin! Right, I have no idea what fackin involves at Kidzone pre-school, but whatever it is, I can only hope that it soon starts sounding more like what it actually is!

I knew very well what Maya had, in actual fact, spent doing at school that morning and that was rallying the teachers around her cause of hypochondria. When I went to pick her up, one of the teachers said in an incredibly concerned voice, Oh dear, what happened to poor Maya? I looked at her quizically and she reminded me about her knee. Her knee? I asked. Yes, yes, her poor knee, the teacher replied sympathetically. And then I remembered. First thing that morning, Maya had got hold of the plasters and said in her best woe-is-me voice I'm not feeling very well (a-la-Charlie-and-Lola - still!) and then promptly found the biggest plaster she could find and stuck it over her knee. Evidently Maya enjoyed the concern so much that she'd decided to keep the plaster on and lap up all the sympathy. Does anyone else have a child that is a complete and utter hypochondriac?? The girl is obsessed with being ill! Is this normal? Suggestions??!

If you are what you eat, then Maya is a big sugar lump

2009-07-05T22:30:00.001-07:00

We are trying to get as much sightseeing in as possible as we are all too aware that the half way mark of our stay here in Bangalore has come and gone and before we know it, we'll be on a plane back to England. The traffic here is reduced to a third of what it normally is on sunday, so obviously this is a good day to visit places that are a little further away. Yesterday we went to the ISKON temple (International Society for Krishna Consciousness) which is located on one of the city's only hills. It was a fascinating experience to witness the throng of devotees pulsing through the temple, praying and receiving blessings along the way.

One of the important Hare Krishna principles is that nobody should go hungry and there is a massive programme going on in and around the city whereby thousands of under-priveleged children are fed a simple but nutritious vegetarian meal each day by outreach Krishna believers. Even at the temple, we were amazed to see that once people have been inside and prayed, they are greeted with a large area of food, and you don't have to pay for any of it. It was a little crowded and since Lily zooms off at brakeneck speed the second we put her down, we opted for the more tranquil restaurant, also serving up an array of delicious food. There was a yummy buffet costing 70 rupees (less than a pound) - amazing value.

This is what Andy, Lily and I ate: Vegetable rice, plain rice and curd rice, coconut and cardamom paneer, spicey lentil and carrot soup, fragrant daal, sambar, poppadoms, mini naans and I'm sure a hundred and one other things I've forgotten.

This is what Maya ate: Rice smeared in sticky sugar, sugar coated rice crispies, raisins and a large slab of toffee that came with the meal as our dessert. Oh, and she also nibbled the corner of a bit of raw carrot after much coaxing. So yes, as I have mentioned before, Maya doesn't really dig Indian food. Shame.

Speaking of food and lunches, we miss our sunday lunches we often used to have with friends and family back in England. (In fact, did you know that the word 'companion' derives from the latin 'with bread' - cum: with & panis: bread, showing how important it was to break bread / have a meal with the people you knew.) We got into quite a pattern - Andy would often do the first course, I'd do the pudding and Maya & Lily would do the table banging and mess making. I mention these lunches because we recently learnt about The Big Lunch campaign going on on 19th July which we are very sad to be missing. If you are reading this in England and haven't heard about it, it's a great idea dreamed up by the Eden Project and asks people to have a street lunch party. How great is that? Click here for more details. I would LOVE to do it here but it's either too hot or too wet at the moment and then there's the issue of the dog poo on the streets aswell. But maybe we'll go back to the ISKON temple on the 19 July to help celebrate The Big Lunch vicariously and join the crowd of lunchers outside the temple this time. After all, you can't get much more community-spirited than that.

Bollywood beckoning?

2009-07-04T20:26:00.001-07:00

As I have recounted numerous times, Maya loves dancing with a passion. Her latest thing is to open an imaginary present and then ask me to dress her in its contents: a ballet dress and ballet slippers. All pink, naturally. Once dressed, she jumps up and pirouettes round the room with wild abandon. Because of her love of dancing, when I heard about a Bollywood dance class going on for 3-7 years, I jumped at the opportunity. Maya too seemed very excited about it and off we went.

It all started really well...on came the music and she jumped up and down and vaguely followed the prompts of the teacher. But after about ten minutes, she suddenly walked to the back of the room and started playing with the puzzles, just like that. Obviously I didn't want to push it so we stayed at the back playing while the other kids strutted their stuff, gently asking every so often if she wanted to join them again. But of this, Maya was absolutely certain. She just wasn't interested. A little while later, we went in to another room at the back where there were other toys but we could still hear the music. And suddenly, being alone she jumped up and threw herself into an energetic dance. "Oh!" I said. "Do you want to go back and dance with the others?" Maya declined. "But you love dancing, Maya." Then she looked straight at me and with a very grown-up, clear little voice these are the exact words she responded with. "Yes, but I love dancing at home." And that said it all.

Maya is a private, independent little person. She dances to her own tune and she dances on her own terms. I could be wrong, but I don't think Maya is ever going to be performer. But the fact that she derives so much pleasure from dancing alone is more than enough. In fact, it's brilliant.

Please can I carry you?

2009-07-02T22:33:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I have visions of Maya as a strapping twenty year old girl out for a walk with her family, and then suddenly it all getting too much and asking to be carried. So Andy, or me, or Lily even have to then haul her on to our back or over our shoulder and stagger on so Maya can have her rest. Because the thing is, you see, that Maya has always been carried, as the photos I've included above will attest. We are sling people. We love slings. But yes, Maya has got very, very used to it. She hasn't quite got the hang of who's doing the carrying though and who's being carried as the way she asks to be carried is 'Please can I carry you? Please? Please?' We point out that this would be lovely but we may be a bit too heavy for her, but hey, it's all just irrelevant semantics to her and before we know it, she's hurled herself on to Andy's back and is demanding her chariot.

Now I'm not saying that, like other little people, Maya's not a good walker. When she's in the right mood. But when she has the choice between using her own little legs and slinging it, she'll always go for the latter. She knows this is nigh on impossible when I'm already carrying Lily (I know someone that used to carry one child on her front and another on her back but she is superwoman and I am not) so doesn't ask, but if we're all out and about, I know for Indian people who simply carry their kids in their arms, we are a sight to behold.

The last picture in this sequence was taken yesterday morning as Maya's daddy takes her to school on his back every morning. She is wearing her favourite Indian outfit and has her bag on her back. Andy says she sings all the way and the pair of them attract so much attention on the twenty minute journey that they actually stop traffic. Priceless.

Why a pavement is not just a pavement

2009-07-01T22:37:00.000-07:00

Some of the local people I have met here find it unusual, if not somewhat eccentric, that our family walk as much as we do. This is not a city for walkers, but we are walkers, what can I say? I've always loved walking (okay, except perhaps for when I was very little and my mother constantly kicked us outside for fresh air and treks which I protested at the time but for which nowI'm very grateful!) and hope that Maya and Lily will one day derive as much pleasure from it as Andy and I do.

My love for using my legs does, however, present us with certain challenges here. Let me give you an example of why a pavement is not just a pavement in Bangalore. Yesterday afternoon Maya, Lily and I walked about 400 metres to a new kids club that had opened to just check it out. Maya's latest thing is undertaking journeys armed with notebook and pen to 'jot down' interesting things on the way (there's my girl!) and therefore, on this journey, I also had a chance to note down a few things that made our short journey not your average amble along the pavement. Pavements, after all, are meant to be safe...aren't they?!?!

Here are a few things we encountered:

* A pack of mangey, stray dogs sleeping on the pavement who woke up and bared their teeth at us when we stepped over them.
*Potholes. Many, many of them that lead to heaven only knows where.
*A couple of urinating men (weeing on the verge I might add, not actually on the pavement)
* A motorbike parked lengthways across our path. To get round it we had to edge round quite a precipitous slope as for some unfathomable reason the pavement at this point sat at a 90 degree angle.
* Leaves and wood. Lots of it. Possibly the latest victim of Bangalore's tree-hacking culture.
*On a couple of occasions the pavement simply ran out and there was a large drop back on to the road which Maya thought it was great fun to hurl herself from (jumping is another of her latest fads). It was almost as though whoever constructed it just ran out of steam and thought oh sod it, I can't be bothered to do anymore.
*And before you think it's all bad, we also encountered a chai stand on wheels bang smack in our path, laden with tea and biscuits. I didn't get anything though (much to Maya's chagrin) - we're suffering from enough teeth rot thank you very much.

As I have said countless times before there is never, ever a dull moment in India. We love it (apart from the tree-hacking).

Break from the City

2009-06-29T23:05:00.000-07:00

Our bodies and souls have been craving fresh air, trees that are not surrounded by concrete and wide, open spaces. So on Sunday we made an impromptu decision and went to an organic farm an hour from Bangalore called Navadarshanam (nope, we can’t pronounce it either) which is home to seven families living communally and run on Gandhian principles.

I don’t think we’d appreciated how much Maya needed a rural injection just as much as us. Alright, so Godmanchester is not exactly rural, but fields and meadows were never far from us where we previously lived. In Bangalore, all the orchards and open spaces are long ploughed up to build on every last metre of space and the closest thing you get to a field is a small patch of waste land, lorded over by lots of cows munching away at rotting fruit and vegetables. So yes, we all needed this. When we were being given a tour of the farm our guide, one of the community residents was almost apologetic, saying that there wasn’t really anything to see or do there. Perhaps he thought Maya would be bored. On the contrary, she was calmer and more at peace with herself than I’ve seen in a while. During the hours we were there, her endless tormenting of her little sister completely ceased, she chased dozens of butterflies, stroked the delicate ‘touch-me-not’ leaves which close up when you run your finger down the middle of them, shared gooseberries with some of the resident children, happily asserted her independence from us whilst we browsed in the library and chatted to others whilst she played outside and, most surprising of all, gobbled up every last scrap of the lunch we were given. The reason for my surprise is because this was proper South Indian fare, bursting with delicate flavours, coconut, curry leaves and mustard seeds. It wasn’t spicey though and this obviously won her over. Deepa, delicious though her food is, insists on pouring in half a ton of salt and chilli powder into her cooking and Maya ain’t having any of it.

Sadly, I left my camera behind so the photo above of Maya in contemplative mood wasn’t taken at the farm but a couple of weeks ago when we went to Deepa’s temple with her. I really would have liked to have taken a snap of her at the farm because, as much as Maya enjoyed romping through the fields, she looked priceless – a proper little city chick. She was wearing pink peppa pig sunglasses, a white bandana which was tied a-la-Maya, making her look like a cross between Bjorn Borg and the mad professor, combat trousers and a pink spotty hand bag which carried her plastic mobile phone. If she owned high heels, I have no doubt at all she would have donned these too.

The irony is not lost on us that whilst Andy and I are both undoubtedly country bumpkins at heart, Andy is just embarking on his career in urban water supply. But hey, the way we see it is that we’ll make the most of all that city life has to offer during the next years and then when we’ve had our fill of it, retire to a peaceful field somewhere and live in a cob house and have chickens. Oh yay. And then Maya can go and collect the eggs each morning in her high heels with her array of sparkly pink bags. After all, country folk are pretty much expected to be a bit on the eccentric side, aren’t they.

Cooler climes for an English Rose

2009-06-27T06:47:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Maya was in raptures because it was cool enough to wear a cardigan to school. A cardigan! Now this may not sound very exciting, but our Maya is an English rose through and through. You may remember in an earlier blog that Maya announced that she didn't like the sunshine and has reminded me of this several times since. And each time I just look at her and think, oh dear. India is possibly one of the worst places in the world to have an antipathy to sunshine. But she does a very good job of hiding away from it under her sunhat. But anyway, this is becoming less and less necessary as it's definitely cooling down and the last few days it's actually been - joy! - on the chilly side.

I've always been quite fond of cardigans myself because my name means cardigan in Spanish (seriously) and happily oblige in her cardy fetish, getting her all kitted out. The photo above shows Maya earlier today with long sleeves and no hat, enjoying the cool air. I'm not sure where we'll be going next, but if Maya had any say in it, I imagine she'd ask for the Mongolian Steppes or the Siberian Plains or hey, just England in winter time. Then our English Rose could don multiple cardies to her little heart's content.

Maya's Leetle Lamb

2009-06-23T07:12:00.000-07:00

After having written the other day that Lily is picking up some Indianisms, well she can't speak much yet whereas Maya obviously can and she's starting to come out with some brilliant Bangalorean talk. When she's in the mood, Maya sings so loudly and so vigorously that I feel sure she must be entertaining a far larger number than just her family. Latest in the Maya charts comes Mary had a little lamb. But in this song, 'little' is pronounced 'leee-tul'. And in the song she sung me today on return from school (I'd never heard it before), she warbled at top volume 'My God is sore wonderful', 'sore' presumably being her Indian pronounciation of the word 'so' as opposed to her God being in pain of any sort.

Whilst we're on the subject of the word 'so', the reason I've included the second picture of Lily having her cheek pinched is to demonstrate what both the girls have to contend with several times each day. Lily is completely blaise about it now whereas Maya still gives people a good slapping if they go near her cheek. The photo was taken at the weekend when we were just sitting there and I had my camera with me and suddenly a hand came in and SNAP! I got my photo. The cheek pinching is generally accompanied with words along the lines of 'Sorrrrrrrre sweet!' which is what reminded me of this and prompted me to include this little tangent in today's blog.

Oh, and talking of tangents, if you've read this far, please could you do me (or the Amazon I should say) a favour and click here to protest against the Brazilian government's legalisation of deforestation? Western superbrands (eg Tesco and IKEA) that we support are hugely benefiting from this. Have a quick read of the article and take 'cyber-action' at the bottom. C'mon, it'll take you five minutes. And I know I'm using Maya's blog as a soap box, but hey, it's her future.

Role Reversal

2009-06-22T05:56:00.000-07:00

Before I write this post, I'd like to point out that many of the taxi drivers in Bangalore are very pleasant, competent men. But today I had a big old run in with a taxi driver. Hmmm... so much for my switch from rickshaws to taxis keeping my blood pressure low...It got me so hot under the collar that when we were deposited from the taxi, obscenities being shouted after me, I must've looked like I was about to lose the plot. Because as we stood on the roadside, my face as red as a chilli, Maya kissed my hand several times and and said 'Don't worry, don't worry, everything's going to be alright.' I nodded up and down and thought yes, you're right, I must keep this in perspective. It wasn't until later on that I realised what a bizarre role reversal we'd fallen into, with my three year old daughter effectively telling me to calm down!

To treat Maya for her thoughtfulness (and to help calm her Mama's frayed nerves), we went on an immediate hunt for cake and ended up at a place we've been to several times. As we walked through the door they gave us that Oh no, not you look. And I can't say that I blame them in the slightest, because each time we've been, we've succeeded in transforming a genteel, clean and tidy little cafe into a complete mess with crumbs/cake/juice/spilt tea/puke all over the chairs/table/floor/wall/ceiling/waiters. Sigh. Sometimes I wonder if I'm fit to be mother to two small children. Nevertheless, one large chocolate muffin later, I felt much better and Maya led me by the hand back out on to the crazy streets of Bangalore.

ps - The family photo above was not taken today. Today, my face was as red as the headscarf I am wearing.

Goldilocks and the three chocolates

2009-06-20T02:55:00.000-07:00

When I went to pick Maya up from school yesterday, she pointed to her chocolate smeared mouth with a sticky hand. 'Look - gog-luck,' she said with her mouth stuffed full of the stuff and then grinned at me with brown teeth. Delightful. 'How many chocolates have you had, Maya?' I asked, none too happy that she's being given chocolate at school anyway (I know, I'm a mean, miserly mother). 'Three!' she quipped, sticking her fingers in the air. But 3 is most definitely her favourite number at the moment because of her recent birthday so I 'm doubtful.

When I asked Maya's teacher how she got on today, the reply was 'Oooh, Maya did sooo well with answering the questions from Goldilocks and three bears so we gave her some chocolates.' I sigh - they think I'm a nightmare mother as it is, particularly since I said I wasn't happy about Maya watching so much TV at her 'Montessori' school and they gave me that Come on lady, give us a break, your kid's only here for 3 months anyway face. So I zip my mouth shut, but just before we leave, I try to say in a jokey voice (though it probably didn't work) 'Not too many chocolates. ok?!' 'Oh, don't worry!' replies the teacher. 'We only gave her six or seven.' Six or seven? In my books, that's quite a few. No wonder Maya loves going to school these days, what child wouldn't if they're fed six or seven chocolates! I'm about to say something in response but then I just sigh again and think, oh what's the point. After all, dozens of people I've met here have advocated that honey would work a treat on Lily's teething gums (I bet it would) and that cocopops is considered one of the healthiest breakfasts available.

So I think I'll just have to take off my chocolate police hat whilst we're here. Oh, and could somebody please book Maya in to see a good dentist when we're back at the end of september too? Ta very much.

Lovely Lily

2009-06-17T07:07:00.001-07:00

Yes, Lily is still with us. I know that sometimes her voice gets a little lost within all these tales of adventuring Maya, but isn't this always the case - that the second child has to shout louder to get heard??

Before I get on to Lily, since my last birthday blog, the excitement was clearly all too much for both Maya and myself: poor Maya must have devoured too much chocolate cake and it all reappeared during the night. Her cocoa hangover continued the following day and she was pretty glum, sensitive and exhausted. As for her mama, I finally succumbed to my first bout of Bangalore belly and spent the entire day in bed (I honestly can't remember the last time I did that), Deepa looking after Lily in the morning and Andy coming to my rescue in the afternoon. Thankfully, it seems to have been a 24 hour belly bug and am loving the curries once again today.

And so...our lovely Lily. Where to begin? She's turning into quite the little character. Here are a few things she loves doing:

* Climbing as far into the cupboard as she can go and making a little den back there
* Chewing away at any shoes she can get hold of (She must have been a faithful dog in her previous life)
* Munching crayons
* Antagonising her big sister. Seriously, she gives as good as she gets. If Maya annoys her, she goes in for the kill and bites her very hard. And a bite from a teething baby is painful, believe you me.
* When we come to a standstill in trafiic, flirting with nearby motorcyclists and car drivers from inside the rickshaw and making them all smile. She beams at everyone and even smacks her lips at the lucky ones.
* Dancing. As soon as any music comes on, if she's sitting down she sways so vigorously from side to side that she nearly topples over and if she's standing up holding on to something, she bounces her little chubby legs up and down like a proper diva.
* Eating. Lily luuuuurves her food and every single meal time eats twice as much as her big sister. (Though I've discovered one - just one food she won't eat and that's my home-made hummous - hurrumph!!)
* Walking, which she's not far off doing. She now monkey walks around just holding on to one of our fingers. I just hope I'm there to see her first steps (I wasn't with Maya!)

Lily has also picked up a few 'Indianisms' from Deepa. Here's my favourite: Many people here, rather than saying 'yes', incline their heads upwards slightly and say 'uh', which actually sounds close to a grunt. I know that 'uh' is easier to say than 'yes', but it's priceless to hear her say that in the exact same way as Deepa.

Apart from her painful teeth (for which homeopathy BC21 is working a treat), Lily has been a very happy, very healthy little girl, the healthiest of us all in fact. She's changing so quickly, as you can see from the photos and I just can't wait to get to know her better. As I promised a few months ago, Lily - I promise I'll do a Lily blog one day and then you can take the centre stage. In the meantime, continue being the smiling, singing, dancing, gorgeous little girl you are. And please don't grow up too fast.

Maya is Free

2009-06-14T07:42:00.000-07:00

Three years ago today, on a warm and sunny evening, Maya was born in our bedroom as Beethoven's Emperor Concerto was playing. Little did we know at the time how our lives were about to change or how, three years on, we'd be enjoying another sunny day with our two children on the other side of the planet. What a rollercoaster of a three years its been, with such tremendous highs and lows. But how amazing to have the opportunity to be here in India to celebrate our little girl's third birthday. I can hardly believe she is now three, or 'free' as she pronounces it. But I rather like hearing her declare 'I am free!', so certainly won't change her pronounciation.

Before you think the first picture above I've inserted incorrectly, I wanted to add a picture of Maya's second birthday in Godmanchester. I had a touch of nostalgia this morning, thinking about all the great parties we've had under the birthday tree back home, celebrated with lots of friends and family, so thought I'd include this photo as a happy memory. This year couldn't be more different, we just had our little family and I had a few moments of feeling bad for Maya, that she wasn't surrounded by lots of the people she loves on her birthday. But you know what, it didn't last long. Firstly, because this feeling would then be washed away by that surge of excitement that sometimes engulfs me and says We're in India. INDIA!!! And that takes some beating. The second reason is because, as the day wore on, I realised that (no offence to loved ones back home!), as long as presents and even more importantly, CAKE featured in her day, Maya really couldn't have cared less whether she celebrated her birthday with two or two hundred people. Perhaps this wouldn't be the case a few years on, but for a two year old turning three, she was happy as larry and I can say with confidence that she had a fabulous day.

The photos above tell the story...Maya woke up to a decoration-filled room and a be-ribboned chair on which she ate her breakfast and opened her presents. The sunglasses she has on her head (thank you Nanny & Grampa!), amongst many other gifts were a great hit and have rarely left her face all day. She even refused to take them off for bath time. After a trip to our local tailor to get some clothes altered (I am in love with the tailors here - it's such a lost art in the UK), we went to 'Monkey Maze' for an hour. Monkey Maze is a big play centre with plastic balls, slides, climbing equipment and lots of books, games and toys and it's been the perfect afternoon out for us and we go about once a week. It's actually pretty calm as has only recently opened and is run by Anita, one of the kindest, loveliest people I've met since being in Bangalore. (Oh, and Maya's wearing her chosen pink dress in this picture that I scorned in a previous blog...and okay, I admit she looks pretty sweet...)

After some family skyping and lunch back home we headed out to the Jayamahal Palace Hotel for a swim. Her school friend Aanya was meant to be joining us but was unwell so instead it was just lil old us and our French friend Jean-Francoise we met when we first came to Bangalore. The weather was perfect - warm, but not too hot with a lovely breeze and we had a great time swimming, eating cake (note the tiger theme - thought it was apt since it'll probably be the only birthday Maya will spend in India. Or maybe not....) and drinking copious amounts of chai. Maya was on fantastic form and was coming out with some brilliant comments this afternoon, my favourite being 'When I'm younger, I'm going to climb up to the clouds.' Good plan Maya, can I come too?

We finished the day off back home with naked musical statues (Maya, not us!!) as we all boogied round the apartment to Buena Vista Social Club and a few episodes of Charlie and Lola and she is now away with the fairies, fast asleep with her pink sunglasses wrapped firmly around her face. So, our little one is three. And she is also free. We have seen so many children here who have their childhood's taken away from them. We have so, so much to feel thankful for.

Magic Maya

2009-06-11T07:13:00.000-07:00

Having written just a few days ago how wonderful I thought Charlie and Lola (Maya's latest fad) were, I could now quite happily wring their giggling cartooned necks. The reason for this is because for some reason there is a particular episode that Maya has become obsessed with, when Lola is, in her words, feeling 'really, ever so not well.' As a result, whenever I now ask Maya to do something, she suddenly pulls the corners of her mouth down, puts on her best folorn face and often dives into her infamous horizontal position, claiming that she's not feeling very well. Hmm....perhaps I'll have to introduce the story of the boy that cried wolf to her a little earlier than I'd imagined...

Last night however, Maya was not feeling unwell and when I asked her if she'd like to come out with me she jumped at the chance. I've started volunteering one evening a week at a Leonard Cheshire home (an international network of homes and centres for people with various disabilities). The reason I chose this place is because I was a volunteer for a few years back in England at a Leonard Cheshire home and really enjoyed it, and although the Bangalore home couldn't be more different, I thought it would be interesting to stay with the same organisation. Maya and Lily nearly always came with me back in England and at the start, Maya was pretty scared of going but by the end, just before we came to India, she referred to the residents as 'our friends in wheelchairs.'

The residence here is home to females aged between 5 and 80, the majority of whom have polio. It's the younger ones, particularly those in their teens, that want to chat the most. When I turned up with Maya last night, they were very, very over-excited and of course Maya had to deal once more with lots of cheek-pinching and dozens of faces about half an inch from hers calling her name again and again. Naturally this was all just too much initially, and I had to explain in the gentlest way possible that she was happy to be here but didn't really like too much attention. We spent an hour there and I was really proud of the way she dealt with it. Whilst the girls were surprised that she was so 'shy' and didn't want to get up and sing and dance for them (seriously, that's what everyone seems to do here!), as her mother and someone who knows her well, she handled the inquisitiveness and excitement with a great deal of courage and grace. I could almost see her making a physical effort, and enjoying the feeling of bravery that came with this. She knew she was a 'big girl' as normally she would have been tucked up in bed at that time and she kept asking 'Is it night time? Is it night time?', a big grin spreading across her face when I told her that it was.

The girls told us that Maya means 'magic' and at one point we sat on the grass, eating mangoes with bats swooping over our heads whilst they serenaded Maya with a song in Tamil actually all about a girl called Maya. Whether or not she wants to return with me is another matter, I'll leave that one up to her. But here, like at the home in England, she is witnessing the incredible strength and creativity people display in the face of their disabilities and it's definitely never too young to be exposed to this.

Thought for the day

2009-06-10T08:32:00.000-07:00

Here's my thought for the day:

That you know your life has changed irrevocably when you hear your mobile phone ringing, pull it out, start trying to talk into it and only realise several moments later that you actually holding your two year old's plastic toy phone against your ear.

Highs and lows

2009-06-08T22:21:00.000-07:00

Oh to be at the age again when you can just kick your feet back and dance to your heart’s content, no matter who’s watching and no matter what you look like. The photo above shows Maya dancing on – ahem – a drain. We’d just got out of a taxi and she launched into a fabulous, impromptu dance (doubtless inspired by the Bollywood music that the taxi driver had been blasting out) which lasted about five minutes and then off she went on her way again. The other photo, incidentally, shows the road which Maya's school is on. (If you want to see any of these photos bigger, you just have to click on them.)

I am very, very happy and relieved to report that in the past several days Maya (on the whole) seems far more settled and content than she has done in a while. I’m sure there are a few reasons for this. For a start, her urinary tract infection, whilst not completely cleared up, is almost on its way out. There is also the matter of her impending third birthday which, when mentioned, sends in into such a frenzy of delight and excitement because there’s a new pink dress waiting for her and there’ll be a chocolate cake with a tiger on top and balloons and dancing and sooo many presents and, and, and….well the anticipation if it all is almost too much for a two-nearly-three-year-old to bear. Maya goes round sticking three fingers virtually up the nose of any person who’s happened to ask how old she is going to be. It’s wonderful though – her excitement is truly infectious.

The other, and possibly most significant reason why I think we’re being reunited with the old Maya is because she is no longer bored in the mornings. School, so far, has been a great success. The fight she puts up upon arrival is, according to Andy, incredibly half-hearted and once she sees that lots of the other kids are upset (Maya is the ‘big girl’ of the class, one of if not the eldest), she sets about comforting them and exerting her authority, knowing the place as she does from her summer camp days there. Although we go out every afternoon, a single morning can seem like an eternity to a little person, particularly if they're insufficiently stimulated. I feel bad about this now, because even though I was only escaping for about an hour or so to write in my bedroom, I do think that Deepa's attention was far more focussed on Lily rather than Maya and by the time I'd really figured that out, it was the end of the summer holidays anyway. So, let's hope that this new contentment at school lasts.

Having said that Maya is happier at the moment, there are two matters in which I am really, really struggling with her and I would just love some help or advice on these. Firstly, if she has a nap in the afternoon (instigated by her when she's tired - I no longer ask for her to lie down), the mood she wakes up in is something akin to a scene from an Alfred Hitchcock movie. It has got to the point that I dread it if she drops off because I can pretty much guarantee what'll happen later. Parents among you, have you ever experienced this? Sometimes I can distract her with stories / snacks / drinks / songs etc etc but on other days, like yesterday it can take as long as two hours to get Maya to calm down from the complete state she has worked herself into.

Which leads me to the second matter that I'm finding it difficult to know how to deal with. Maya is a daddy's girl, no two ways about it. That's absolutely fine, but what is not so fine is that at some stage most days (often during one of her post-nap meltdowns), Maya clocks that Daddy is not there. And she wants him to be. Knowing that he is at work and cannot come home makes her desire to see him there and then even stronger and everything gets very emotional. Short of me morphing into Andy, I don't know what I can do. I've tried reasoning with her, promising that he'll be back soon, trying to put her on the phone to him...all kinds of things. But more often than not I end up feeling like a wicked stepmother rather than Maya's flesh-and-blood-Mama! Help?!?! What to do, what to do....

Andy keeps reassuring me that what we are experiencing with Maya is completely normal. I tell myself that he's right, but I must confess there are times when I watch her writhing around on the floor in what looks like phyiscal but is actually emotional agony and I think What is going on? And what on earth can I do? More reassurance needed, pleeeeease!!

ps - On another note entirely, does anybody own the book 'The Reader' and would be prepared to send it to me out here??? A bit cheeky asking I know, but books here are quite pricey. I recently saw the film and really enjoyed it but am sure the novel must be even better.

Post Offices and Pink Temples

2009-06-06T01:49:00.000-07:00

If I'm ever having one of those afternoons when I'm thinking how on earth am I going to pass these long, hot hours before evening falls without Maya or Lily or me or all three of us losing the plot, sometimes we go to the post office. I know this may sound like a strange afternoon activity for two small girls and whilst it may not always be 'fun', one thing I can be guaranteed of is that it will be lengthy. Which has its benefits. Plus there's the bonus that it's situated right next to the 'pink temple'...(more of that later)

Maya quite enjoys these trips to the post office. For a start, she gets to sit on the high counter top and indiscriminately comment on whatever takes her fancy in the way that only small children can get away with (Last time, she pointed to one of the employees and shrieked at the top of her lungs 'Mummy! Look at that man's beard!' So I did, and so did everybody else in the post office, including all the poor man's colleagues who stared and stared at his rather splendid wizardesque beard as though for the first time). Secondly, Maya enjoys this outing because she invariably gets to see Mummy in a complete flap which must, admittedly, be pretty entertaining. It is never a straightforward matter going to the post office. Never. Ever. Here is what happened about a week ago which typifies my general experience there:

Me: Please can I post these cards to England?
Post Office Employee: Certainly. That'll be fifteen rupees for each postcard.
Me: Oh. But last week I came it was eight rupees and....
POE: No madam, it's fifteen rupees.
ME: I've just put about ten postcards in the postbox outside with eight rupee stamps on them.
POE: But Madam, it's fifteen rupees. Who told you it was eight?
Me: (I look at her hard. Names, I must admit I'm pretty useless at but faces I rarely forget). You did.
POE: No, Madam.
Me: Yes, Madam.

I can see we're getting nowhere in a hurry, the queue behind me is growing and I'm pretty sure it was at this point that Maya interjected with her beard observation which didn't much help to speed things along. So I try another tack.

Me: Right, so it's fifteen rupees. Fine. I need five fifteen rupee stamps please for these cards.
POE: Certainly.

Brilliant, half the problem solved. But I still need to get my postcards back and I take a deep breath.

Me: Please can somebody unlock the postbox for me?
POE: Why?
Me: Because I just posted lots of cards in there with eight rupees on them.
POE: Oh, no problem Madam, no problem. They will get there.

Right. Now I'm confused. Very confused. And hot and sweaty and Lily is doing a wriggling eel impression in the sling and Maya is doing a noisy rendition of Little Bo Peep on the counter. And my nerves are starting to seriously fray. I put on my best pleading voice.

Me: Please can you open it? Please? Please? Do you have a key? Does anyone have a key?

The lady yells something in Kannada over her shoulder and motions for me to wait to one side whilst she starts serving other people. About ten minutes later, a man appears behind her who looks like he's just been woken up from his afternoon snooze and can barely keep his eyes open. A lengthy explanation ensues from the lady I was dealing with and eventually he slouches out then shortly after, returns with the most enormous sack of post from the postbox which he now needs to sort through to find my postcards. Please let me look! I want to cry. Please, or if not, could somebodyd kindly give this man a hearty injection of caffeine? But he's gone, off round the corner, dragging his sack behind him like some reluctant Father Christmas.

Approximately twenty minutes later, he re-emerges triumphantly with eight postcards. I can't remember how many I posted but I was fairly sure it was about ten. . By this stage, we've been regaled with one man's photos of his granddaughters in America, Maya and Lily have had their cheeks pinched about fifty times and Maya has hit one man who squeezed too hard. So I'm not about to send the man back to look for the other two. All I want to do is get these accursed cards in the post and get out of here.

I wait in the queue again, get to the front, ask for more stamps to make up the difference and then, only then does the lady say these words to me:

Madam, the cost of postcards has risen this last week.

What? What?? Why on earth didn't she just say that to me in the first place?! I know this wouldn't have changed the fact I'd still posted my cards in the postbox but knowing this may well have kept my blood pressure low. Some things I shall never, ever understand.

By now, I've lost several pints of water in my sweating and we're all pretty dehydrated so we go next door to the 'Pink Temple'. Now, as you'll see from the picture above, it's not particularly accurate to call it pink. But the fact that it has any pink in it at all is good enough for Maya, so pink it is. It is a Sai Baba Hindu temple, built for the devotees of the living Sai Baba, a South Indian guru, Hindu mystic and orator who also sports the most amazing afro ever (I mean no disrespect - it really is quite something). We love going to the temple as it is a cool, peaceful haven which smells of incense, sandalwood and jasmine. Everyone takes their shoes off and sits on the floor praying or in quiet cotemplation but last time a group of women were chanting and singing which I found wonderfully calming and restorative. Maya knows that this is not the place to belt out Little Bo Peep or any other song for that matter, and nobody seems to mind if Lily crawls around.

Whoever built the post office next to the pink temple (or vice versa) could not have possibly known that one day, a hot sweaty English woman with one child on her chest and another at her side would not be suffering a nervous breakdown as a result of this happy accident in town planning. Phew.