fa la la la la, la la la la

The Monday after our Thanksgiving soirée, we hosted our inaugural FHE Christmas sing along. We got all the Christmas decorations up and invited friends and neighbors from around Palm Meadows to join us for an hour and a half of singing. My friend Martina brought her violin. She and I did a couple of duets {Gesu Bambino- my favorite!} and she played obligato to the rest of our songs. It was a fun opportunity to introduce the idea of Family Home Evening to our friends - the kids gave opening and closing prayers. Everyone came in their pajamas and brought a treat to share. Cori and I cranked up the AC to help things feel more cozy. Our dear friends, the Jacksons, came. And Grace, Grant and Eden all had friends attend from their classes. A few other moms stayed to sing with us as well. It was the start of a great tradition.

Thanksgiving

As soon as the month of November hit, all the US expats were talking turkey. Good turkeys are not easy to find and they are pricey. A group of us from Church made plans to share a table for the holiday. Three birds were prepared for the weekend- each family that cooked one got it from a different store so we could compare notes, prices, and results. I got our bird from the butcher we regularly go to for our meats. It was the biggest of the three, and the least expensive. It came as a frozen, plastic-wrapped hunk. A few days before the feast, Selvi and I moved it from the freezer to the fridge. As it thawed, a problem began to emerge. 

I screamed out loud once it dawned on me what I was looking at. Selvi gets all the credit for doing the dirty work. Beheading a turkey is not for the faint of heart. She also stood at the sink and plucked out the rest of the feather nubs...

Once Selvi had worked her magic, I brined the turkey, stuffed it with compound butter and it roasted up almost like what we are used to (and the gravy made from the drippings was on point!). Together, Selvi and I made a sweet potato casserole (the sweet potatoes here are yellow) and a green bean casserole (can't get canned soup or canned beans here... so we did it all from scratch).

We ended up with 23 lovely people at our house for the big meal. Thanksgiving Thursday was not a holiday, so we hosted the event the following Saturday. That morning all the guys took the kids to the green space at our friends complex for a turkey bowl. We were scheduled to begin our meal around 2. But Indian + mormon standard time converged in a resulting 3PM lunch.

Everyone brought an impressive amount of food. All the beloved staples were present. It was a taste of home and we were so happy to have shared it with these fine people.

Diwali: Coorg and the Golden Temple

We quickly changed into what dry and clean clothes we had left and shuttled across the river to meet Suresh for our drive home. We were just a bit underway when Suresh asked if we wanted to see a famous Buddhist temple right along the way. Absolutely!

We learned that there are lots of Tibetan settlements in India. There were thousands of expatriates looking for a new home in the early 60's, and the government of India granted enormous land leases. There are several such communities in the state of Karnataka and one of the biggest is in the Coorg area. This large community has built a big temple compound that is a home to several hundred monks. It was a quick and totally worth it detour.

Eden being asked for yet another photo.

The solid gold statues are filled with thousands of hand written prayers. Everything inside and out is insanely ornate.

Thousands of lights burning for Diwali.

The temple is surrounded by a two-storied courtyard of dormitories. We saw a few monks inside the temple compound and spotted several more through out the village on our drive out.

This was the Friday night of Diwali week. We had a beautiful drive home. Residential areas were a blaze with candles and strings of multi colored light strands. Then, fireworks. For hours of our drive and for hours after we were home, thousands and thousands of fireworks lit up the sky. 

Diwali: Dubare Elephant Camp - Safari and wild things

We really felt like we were smack dab in the middle of wildlife at this place. A funny lost-in-translation moment: As soon as we checked in, a few rangers began hanging this enormous net outside our cottages. I asked what it was for. The ranger said that it was an elephant hammock and then smiled. "Elephant hammock?" I asked. He said that it wasn't for elephants but for the monkeys to play in. "The monkeys will come down so close to the cottages?" I was really excited about this. He and his buddies laughed. The next afternoon I ran into the same ranger. He asked why we weren't playing on the elephant hammock. I told him I didn't think the monkeys would come if the kids were playing on it. "Your childrens ARE the monkeys! HAhahahaha!" Boy, did I feel foolish. So we gave the kids the green light and they killed hours on this thing. Everyone had sore muscles and rope burns to show for it.

Our favorite games were watching Cori do flips and having Cori shake the net. I was nearly launched right off the hammock by the latter game. Grant attempted to flip in like his dad and managed to face plant in the rope and fold himself in half backwards. It was a painful ordeal for him. I only mention it because we all laughed about it for hours afterwords.

Part of our stay there included a jeep safari out into the jungle. Just looking at this vehicle made me so happy. The safari was along a well beaten path out through the mahout village. We got up close and personal with the royal Mysore lady one last time.

Once we cleared the village we started looking. First sighting: a peacock. They camouflage surprisingly well for how boldly they are colored.

We also caught sight of a large black Indian squirrel. They make huge nests in the trees. They moved really quickly, but we spotted the tale of one that was hanging out near its nest.

We drove through groves of teak trees thick with turmeric underbrush. The turmeric turns that deep rusty orange color when the leaves dry out.

After that, it was a lot of birds and wild flowers. At one point, our guide got really excited. He saw some tracks along the dirt road we were driving on. He told us they were wild dog tracks. We were relatively non plussed. He, whispering all the while, explained that he loves Indian wild dogs. He said that they were the most lethal hunters in the jungle.

The wildlife video he showed us that night was about the Indian wild dog. We were impressed and I found myself wishing I had taken a picture of the tracks he showed us!

Our other wildlife encounter was living off the porch of the boys' cottage. This huge spider had a web spread above head level and it was a regular part of the family by trip's end. Grant writes all about it in his little entry below.

Our last day there, we were going to go do some more with the elephants. Not the full river experience again as we had a long and squished-up drive ahead of us. But our plans were interrupted by steady rain. We went down to the riverbank waited for the mahout. But the weather was slowing them a bit as well. Alas, it was time for us to head back across the river.

This was the best picture I got of our guide, unfortunately. He was so great with our kiddos, and was enthusiastic about his job. He knocked on our doors when it was time for meals and activities, paddled us around the river, and set up all our other experiences.

Favorite moments from the mouths of our babes:

Grace- I really liked being able to just hang out with wild life all the time. I thought it was hilarious how they told us the elephant hammock was for monkeys and we kept looking for monkeys until they finally told us it was actually for us. It was also really fun playing on the elephant hammock. One time when we were playing, there was a cow and her calf. And the mother cow came wondering very close to us. We could almost touch it. We played on that net for hours at a time. I also thought the safari was fun. It was cool to see all that wildlife in its natural habitat and so close to us. The campfires we went to were made better by the domesticated dogs. The little shows that they played for us taught me more about the national animal of India, the tiger, and the rarely seen wild dog. I think the part I liked most of all was being able to wash the elephants. It was fun being able to not only swim with them but to be able to wash them.

Grant- My favorite part of the trip was that I got to play a lot with the dogs and my family. We did fun stuff together everyday. I really liked the big spider outside our cottage. It was, like, 5 inches long. And Dad took gum out of his mouth and threw it at the spiderweb. Then the spider jumped on it and thought it was a bug because it was warm. It started widing it up and then dropped it once it knew it wasn't a real bug. I liked going in the coracle. It was fun seeing the whole camp from the river and spinning around in the water. We got to see most of the river and I thought it was cool that people could walk across the water because it was shallow, but it didn't look like it was. Another one of my favorite parts was seeing the elephants. We got to touch the elephants' skin and we got sprayed by them. Before the elephants came, me and dad skipped some rocks while the girls played around climbing. I also liked feeding the elephants. On the safari we went on, I saw more than 12 big spiders. Before the safari, we watched a movie. I really liked both movies. One was about tigers, how they are getting hunted and they are really rare. And the second one was about wild dogs. I liked the food. It was nice to try some Indian food and it was really good. I liked playing on the tire swing. Also, one of the dogs had puppies. They were less than a foot long. But we could not pet them or touch them. I also liked the walks we went on.

Eden- I liked the campfire. We got to have food there. I REALLY liked playing on the elephant hammock. Daddy would shake us and we would fly up and down. We got to pet elephants. The elephants were splashing mommy and the family. We also got to see a peacock and it was blue. It had feathers on its head that looked like sticks with fluffy balls. My favorite movie was the one about tigers. I remember that mommy won Left Center Right every time and so she got to eat the most treats.

Diwali: Dubare Elephant Camp - The Elephants!

After the coracle ride and a big breakfast we walked down to the river bank to watch the elephants come in. Dubare is an elephant rescue camp. It is an interesting co-op of government, tourist, and native contribution.

I suppose it all starts with the native component. The mahout are the village people who have lived in these jungles and have trained and utilized the elephants for generations.  Dubare obtains the other elephants that are added to their herds. Some are still considered 'rogue' and only the rangers and mahout can approach them. But most are completely domesticated. The most famous elephant in India, who is part of the royal Desshura festival at Mysore Palace, lives at Dubare. We got to see her twice. The guide told us that asian elephants eat around 100 kg of food per day. The government subsidizes 10 kg of food per elephant per day. The elephants are sent out into the jungle to graze for the rest of their food in the late afternoon and then are rounded up every morning and herded to the river to have their bath. During the day, the elephants help the mahout with their work, and are used as a tourist attraction at Dubare. There is a rink where people can take an elephant ride, pens where people can feed elephants, and demonstration areas where people can watch the elephants perform other elements of training. All of these activities are for a fee which goes towards financially supporting the camp. Our guide told us that they get upwards of 2000 visitors a day to see the elephants. As it was just our family and one other family there that day, they closed most of the activities. We still got to bathe the elephants and feed them.

This boy had walked his bike across a low part of the river and Gracie jumped in to help him hoist it up the stairs.

We waited at the banks for some time. There is no guaranteed arrival schedule. The elephants will wander deep into the jungle to graze and it takes a while to find them. The boys skipped stones and the girls visited the nearby squattie facilities.

At last, they started to file in starting with these cute babies. The mahout have vocal and physical commands they give to guide the elephants into place and to get them to lie on their sides. The elephants are then hand scrubbed by the mahout.

The first batch that came through were 'rogue' or 'danger' elephants. We just watched from the bank. But very quickly after that we were invited in to help. Our guide took our camera and snapped us some great memories.

Pretty sure all this spraying was done on purpose...

We were in the water with them for at least an hour. Then we were taken up to the feeding pens. The mahout use the government given food to make pellets of hay, seeds, and salt. For a fee we were able to take turns feeding them the pellets until they were all gone. We watched one of the mahout make a pile of pellets on the table. An elephant sidled up behind him, helped herself to one, and then - while still chewing the first - she started stacking the pellets from the table into a pile between her front legs. Finally, the mahout noticed and thwapped her on the head and moved all the pellets from the ground to the other side of the table. She reached her trunk around behind him and started making her pile again...

I wish I had asked what the chains are for. We were led to understand that the elephants roam the jungles at night. I wonder if it is for safety when all the tourists are in...