We hope you are enjoying our blog -
Just to let you know, Ken has written this week with Heather interjecting in italics (having read it!).

Good news - the wasps (I thought they were wasps and not bees!) seem to have gone!! That makes living in the flat so much more enjoyable and less stressy.  However, Heather discovered a nest of a different kind today - we have a washing machine on a balcony and as she turned the switch off behind the machine she found a pigeons nest with two eggs in it - so we are looking forward to the flutter of tiny wings one day!!! 

Last Saturday morning I woke very early, so I decided to take my stick and go buy a newspaper. Why the stick? The other morning I ventured out at 6.20 am to buy a newspaper, but it's not like popping to your local newsagent. Newspapers don't seem to be sold from shops round here. So, I asked someone and he told me where to go, but I'd noticed he carried a stick (and there were others doing the same). "We have a stray dog problem around here", he said. He'd been bitten a while ago and didn't fancy another series of nasty injections. "Ah, I thought. I must get a stick!" Just in case. The newspaper man was sitting in the middle of the car park of the local community centre, dishing out piles of papers to his "paperboys" of all ages. I didn't see many dogs around but now I know why there is a stick by the door in the flat and I go out armed.

A tip if you're coming to India. At the airport you will need two forms as well as your passport: one form for immigration and the other for customs. You will probably get the customs form on the plane - we did. You give it up after immigration control. However, we were not given the immigration form on the plane; they don't have them. They are in the large immigration hallway. Problem was there were about 10 forms for 300 people. So we decided to queue up anyway and tell them, as there was no one else around. "Go for the form", the man said. "There aren't any. I've looked everywhere". He pointed to the other side of the hall and said "Over there". Someone had put out another 10 forms, so we scuttled over as quickly as we could and got two copies just before 300 Japanese students arrived, looking for forms. Good luck! See yer, we're off.

Anyway...we've only been here since 23 September but it feels as if we've been here for a very long time. We are now making our own way each day to Asha by tuk-tuk: Heather with her guitar and resources bag (and hand bag, of course) and sometimes other bits and pieces,usually a large roll of paper, and me, with my rucksack, water bottle and my man bag (Heather made me buy it a few years ago - it is very useful, but I say that grudgingly, as it's really a bit Continental) all in the back of a tuk-tuk. The rides are exhilarating (meaning, you think you are going to crash 5 or 6 times every journey!). Today we did!!! Just a small knock and to be fair, our driver was in the right but still it caused a long, and what sounded like, a heated argument as well as drawing a large crowd and then lots of looking at the dented vehicle. Eventually something was agreed and we all carried on our merry way, tuk tuk driver smiling!!!

Last Friday evening we used the Metro to go to Dilli Haat, a very famous market for clothes, carpets, jewelry etc. The Metro is good! Up the Yellow line we went and a 5 minute walk to the market. It cost 50 Rupees to get in (Foreigners rate, as it says on the ticket). We are, after all, videshee (foreign). Although Heather has as many shawls as pairs of shoes, (I really don't know what he means!!!) she bought a new scarf from Sheikh, the stallholder, who said Heather was his first customer to his new stall. Who am I to disbelieve him? (I'm sure you will agree that a girl can never have enough shawls or just the right one - always room for another and anyway I felt it only polite and honored to be his first customer!!)
I bought some Indian shoes (I was delighted and surprised as thought they were lovely but not sure they were Ken's sort of style)  for an Indian wedding we were invited to. Very nice shoes, but they needed wearing in, as it seems "one size fits all". I decided not to buy the shoes with the curled up toes! (Shame, but these ones are really nice and can be worn on other occasions). That evening we ate in the market.  We had been recommended to try the Momos - delicious, a food from Sikkim. (We will be back another evening I'm sure and I will have to resist the shawls this time!!)

The wedding was last Wednesday - one of the Asha staff, Jibin married Bhaghavi - all the staff went and it was lovely to be included.  The ceremony took place in an Indian Catholic church - all in English, which was a surprise but also great for us. The reception was outside (you can depend on the weather here!!) with all kinds of delicious food.

Last Sunday we went to the Delhi Bible 
Fellowship Church near Connaught Place which was packed, full. We enjoyed the  lively worship and a message encouraging us to really get into the Bible and to read it everyday.

Our teaching is going well - the weekday students have all been having  exams but they finish today. Heather has been having fun on 'the bus' - they were talking about 'friends' and made crafts to do with friendships - the children love the singing and guitar and found 'the hokey cokey' hilarious (I could never have imagined during my teaching career that one day I would be in India, on a bus parked beside several slums with 25 excited children all dancing and singing " you put your left foot in, left foot out.....etc etc.. - incredible, it's the best place to be for me at the moment anyway!!!  Soni, who organises the bus, is delightful - we are really getting on well and have had some lovely conversations together.)

We are beginning to get to know the older students well and hope to go out with them one day soon - they are keen to take us around Delhi and show us some of the special places.

We will update you next week.  

We send you our love.

Ken and Heather  xx