Kerala India photos are posted at www.rtsla.photoway.com

There is no shortage of things to learn in life. Today I decided to give UPS a try since I am so disgusted with the hassles at the post office. It was incredible. I walked into an air-conditioned office; spoke to the receptionist who gave me one form to complete. Yes, one form. I was mailing a shirt to a friend. That was all there was to it. I didn’t have to talk to four-five counter staff or get hassled by an inspector. The cost however was through the ceiling. They only ship packages in that weight range express so it only cost me $54 to send a $19 shirt. Ha! Like I said, there’s no shortage of lessons to learn.

On Monday I did two huge loads of laundry and hung them out to dry. Then I left to run errands. At noon the sky opened up and it rained until last night. I have been here six months (can you believe it?) and it has never rained for two days. Usually you get a 20-40 minute downpour then the sun comes back out. It didn’t rain constantly but we didn’t see the sun until today, Wednesday.

I had stopped by Ron’s office and asked him for a lunch date on Monday. Mr. Kularathna, the trishaw driver I use, would wait for me while I ate lunch. When we left the office it was sprinkling. We walked to the restaurant that is quite near his office, down the lane and it is at the end of the lane. When we came out of the restaurant it was pouring. Since neither of us had an umbrella with us, we were debating whether to make a dash or wait it out. We looked up and there was Mr. Kularathna driving up to save us from getting wet. He is the best, a starman! I couldn’t believe he had thought to do that. I rewarded him with a large bag of deviled (spicy with chili powder) cashews when I got home. That’s a day wages for Geetha. I think Mr. Kularathna makes more than Geetha but he is always bowled over when I give him a bag of cashews.
This evening we are having Mrs. Bakshi and Veena over for tea. Mrs. Bakshi leaves for Maryland in the wee hours of the morning. Her other daughter lives there. We are very sad, as she will be gone for a year. She has a green card and is not allowed to stay out of the US for more than six months. When we moved in, she had just returned from the US. Since we will leave before she returns we promised to look her up when we are in the Washington DC area in early September. Ron has an ICMA national conference in San Antonia and we are going early to see Mark and Rachel, our older son and his wife and their new baby boy that is due August 26th. So we will take an evening and take Mrs. Bakshi to dinner. She has been an angel since we have been here. She taught me how to make chapatti, has brought us breakfast, lunch and dinner at various times. The day we moved in, she brought me lunch. I didn’t have anything in the house to eat so I was very grateful. She is a very spiritual woman and we truly feel blessed to have known her. I have heard stories about landlords hear that make me know we are most fortunate with Veena and Mrs. Bakshi. I’ve been told once a landlord has your money (you pay one year in advance to rent here) they never make repairs. I have heard of landlords who come by your house everyday to make sure you haven’t damaged anything. Oy vey. We will take photos tonight so check the photo site soon for a chance to meet Mrs. Bakshi.