Pulling the wool

 I have finished my eight hours of speaking about walking in the spirit. As always, it is my happy place sharing truth with others. However, I am continually challenged to walk the talk myself and have nearly had a couple of whoopsies. Luckily, they were internal, short lived and did not make it to the outside. 

We were supposed to leave by bus at 3am this morning to travel to S****m in time for a tourist tour. When I say we I mean the 70 people I spoke to at their retreat. It must be a logistical nightmare getting that many people from one place to another, but Amit does it very calmly. and efficiently. 

 Fortunately, we did not leave as early as planned. The call came at 230am to advise us there was a delay. The bus eventually picked us up about 7am. I was grateful for the three hours extra sleep. 

The last 30km of the trip to the foothills was very slow as slips had come down on the road and there was a lot of traffic. We eventually made it at about 3pm and had lunch. 

I am staying in a different hotel than the others. It is nice to have some space to myself after the last action packed 72 hours. 

The hotel is named the Royal Sheep Residency. To be fair compared to the previous two nights it is bit of a sheep pen. That could well the reason it is a third of the price of the other place. It has no air conditioning and no fan. It had no bottle of water, coffee or tea and the sheets and pillowcase did not look particularly clean. I felt bit of a heel but asked for replacements and these certainly look clean. I asked at the desk about air conditioning and the woman said it is not needed in this climate. It does appear other rooms have it though. 

Someone said once that suffering is when you don't get your own way and I think that is a good definition. It is interesting to weigh up in this situation does it really matter if there is no air conditioning or fan?

It is just jolly lucky I am walking in the spirit else I might look for another hotel lol. 

Take the short way home

 At the risk of speaking too soon, I may have figured out how to move around this city. Yesterday I managed to get to church and home. Later in the afternoon I went out again to a big mall.

By accessing an Uber app I can put in where I want to go and almost magically a yellow steed, auto rickshaw, turns up on my doorstep and whisks me away.

 The only trick is getting my location entered in correctly on the return trip home. I found that out the hard way yesterday. One driver gave up on me reaching the pickup point and I gave up on reaching the pickup point for the next ride I ordered. I had walked several hundred metres and still not reached the right place.

Fortunately, the Uber app ave me another pickup point.

If I prefer, I can choose a white steed which is an air-conditioned car but that is for longer distances. I also have the option of motorcycle but not sure I am game to try that in the traffic.

Time of day and weather conditions mean the price of the steed can fluctuate but once locked in can not change. 

The irony of this instant travel solution does not escape me. More than 230 years since Bill Carey arrived here by ship and walked or boated to where he needed to go it takes me minutes not days to reach my destination.

 

 

Consider it pure joy

 

Yesterday on our shopping trip, a fun trip was had by all but only because if we did not laugh we may have cried.

Mossee and I went by tuk tuk to the air conditioned mall nearby. Our mission was to find a salwar chemise top or two for me to wear when I am speaking. Normally this would not be too difficult. Even though my Canterbury farm girl physique is a littler chunkier than the average petite local, there was usually a “big size for memsahib”. Unfortunately memsahib has put on more than just a little weight since she was last in the market for clothes so I knew it would be a challenge to find something to fit.

Usually I have bought a matching salwar chemise set which included trousers and possibly a duparta, scarf, thrown in as well.  The best place to find these were at markets. Nowadays with the advent of air conditioned malls clothing shops sell them.

The shops while selling items cheaper than in NZ are  more expensive than a market. The tops are displayed in exquisitely ordered piles. We unfortunately had to demolish the orderly appearance of the piles to find what we wanted.  We looked for a design I liked, pulled the XXL size from the bottom of the pile and then see  if I  could pull it up over my arms. If the article fitted over my arms, then I might try it on. Otherwise we left it in a semi-tidy pile for someone with a gift  of folding to refold. Mossee said it was ok. I felt a little embarrassed.

After we had done this twenty times or so Mossee hit on the idea of measuring it across the back of my shoulders. This was far more efficient and less heat producing method of deciding if the top might fit. I have not mentioned the heat but the temperatures are in the thirties at present.

 Eventually we found two tops that would suffice. One had matching trousers and for the other one we found some. I need counselling for the price I paid. I am still hoping to find another one or two on a market expedition but I have not told Mossee that yet.

 Later we went fruit and vegetable buying. This was far less exhausting.  We bought papaya, guava and okra. I also found some amla which are Indian gooseberries. We cooked them up this morning. I expected them to turn to mush like gooseberries usually do. To my surprise however, they stayed whole and had a stone in them much like a plum.

 

The reason I bought the amla was because I read somewhere they helped deal with cholesterol. Not sure in the quantities I will eat them my cholesterol numbers will change much though.

Mossee is off to buy m**t this afternoon. A big festival where non-meat eating is esteemed is about to start. No m**t will be available for sale for about a week. From past experience I know it is about to get very noisy and possibly a little crazy.

Catching up with old friends

 Here I am safe and sound in a place similar to Hephzibah but not Hephzibah. Guess there can be more than one city that will be renamed Hephzibah. 

I eventually made it through immigration not because someone took exception to letting an on-holiday journalist into the country but because several plane loads of people arrived at once and there were long queues.

A kind immigration dada let me fill in a form I missed seeing I needed at his desk without making me go to the back of the queue. He also commented on my journalist visa. "You are a journalist," he said with what could have been an admiring tone in his voice.

"Oh no sir," I protested. "Not for the next two weeks. I am on holiday." He seemed to enjoy the joke.

I eventually found my old friend Mossee  outside the building. Only people leaving or arriving on planes are allowed inside the building.  She was wondering if she had missed me. 

We went to catch an Ola which is like an Uber but cheaper. Mossee did not like the look of the car the driver pulled up in. She thought it was a bit bent out of shape. There is no doubt it had been bent out of shape in various places and then bent back in. I wondered if we should drive with someone who possibly could have a penchant to smashing up his vehicle. However,  the car was probably driven by others who might have done the damage. So we gave him the benefit of the doubt and arrived home without any incidents. 

I sat down to a hearty breakfast of chicken curry,  rice, cucumber and  dahl cooked by Mossee's daughter Chame.  I certainly will not need lunch. There was nearly one small astronomical mishap when I noticed a heart shaped something that indeed was a heart. I managed to swallow it down with some rice and dahl with never a nauseus turn of the stomach. For some people chicken feet, hearts and necks are a delicacy but not for this Canterbury farm girl.

I have a lovely large bedroom while the other three in the household share a smaller room. It has a lovely balcony. I do enjoy a sit on a balcony although it is a bit hot for that at present.

The bedroom is complete with a welcome basket of goodies and a large salwar top that Mossee managed to find. 

It is only 11am but feels like mid afternoon which it is at the ends of the earth. Later we will venture out to the mall and see what other super large outfits we can buy to fit me. Friday is market day so we will also go there and buy some guava and ladies finger. 

Seeing the crows cawing melancholically, mother cow wandering wherever she pleases, and hearing the noise of the traffic are like being reacquainted with an old friend. 

Last but not least

This weekend has been a time of lasts. Last speaking time. Last wander around  my favouritist market.

Last naan at my favouritist restaurant. Oh, last naan nearly turned into a disaster. The restaurant was very busy. But kind dada directed me to a table and brought a menu. I decided just to eat naan bread and drink a Thumbs Up.

After a while I could not remember if I had ordered a butter naan or plain naan. So as dada went past I said, "Butter naan dada?"

From his reaction I realised he thought I was saying,"Where on earth is my butter naan."

He shook his head but reappeared shortly with a butter naan. It was a little bit cold which was unusual. Then as I ate it I  thought it was a little bit burnt. When I turned it over it definitely was burnt. Maybe it was a reject and he had given it to me to shut me up.

I could not allow my last naan to be a bad experience so when he went past again I said," Dada naan khub kharap." (Big brother this naan is very bad.)
"Kharap?" he replied.
I nodded.

Soon he came back with a naan was so hot I had to eat it with my knife and fork. It was up to the usual high standard of naan par excellence.


 

Please do not mind I had the air conditioning going in my room.

I was sitting in my room, in the cool fridge like conditions, feeling a little bit embarrassed because I was using electricity to cool my room.

What would William Carey think?

The cool was certainly delicious. I went outside the room to the hallway  and it was like an oven.
I quickly came back in and turned the air conditioning off. After being out in the hall my room seemed very cool.

Later  I found a button on the remote control which read room temp. When  I pushed it nothing happened until I turned the air con back on. There it was - the staggering truth. It was 30 flaming degrees.

I instantly stopped feeling bad about using the air con.

Again I turned the air con back on to check  the room temperature and it was 31 degrees.

At bed time I turned the air con back on. After an hour I was still awake so I looked to see what the room temperature was. It was 26 degrees. Crazy. The room temperature had only dropped five degrees in an hour.

At some point in the night it started to rain so I turned the air con off. In the morning when I opened my window there was a lovely breeze coming in.

As I breakfasted, showered and dressed I realized another advantage of using the air con. The marble floor was very cold.

Now it is nearly 4pm and it is 28 degrees in the room. I have had to close the windows because my blood sucking friends were coming in.

I can feel my face glowing with perspiration.

I wonder how my visitors would like a burst of cold air?

Thinketh maketh the woman

Hephzibah is the perfect place to take ones thoughts captive and make them obedient to Christ.

Why?

 

Simply because several million times a day in response to a look, a word, or an action, a thought will enter the stage of one’s mind and stop midway. The thought, usually of the lying variety, will take a deep breath and begin a soliloquy that could bring tears to the eyes of the most hard hearted person.

“Oh that is not fair,” it wails.

Within a very short time hearing the distress call another thought enters the stage and then there are two voices whinging and moaning and complaining.

Before one knows it there are hundreds of thoughts giving the performance of their lives all over the stage of my mind. They are such drama queens. Each trying to outdo the other. Naughty un Christlike thoughts vying for attention and approval.

And the clamor! One surely cannot hear oneself think for the cacophony.

The solution is found in being alert and diligent. The second the thought starts moving towards the stage lasso it and drag it away. In its place start sending thoughts that are true, noble, right, pure lovely admirable excellent and praiseworthy.

It is especially important to take thoughts captive because what we think affects the way we feel and the way we feel affects the way we speak and act. Nipping thoughts in the bud that are likely to make me feel  grumpy, offended. disappointed or resentful is very important. If I entertain them next minute I could easily say something or do something that I will have to ask forgiveness for.

I do not mind having to ask forgiveness but I would prefer it if I did not need to.