4 Days East Coast

Typical hour on the train

Leah & I tried a fried rice.

Difficult, but worth the effort.

Sirisha was busy stitching a punjabi to give me.

No Indian woman could be without muscles with the work required of them each day. This was grounding together the ginger and garlic. Smelt SOOOOOOOOO good.

Very quickly turned into crab curry! - I helped cut onions INSIDE while Leah took the pictures!

Picking chicken off the bone, is rather different from picking crab from the shell.

Gathering leaves to create henna

My gorgeous girl

Arriving in Hyd, I managed to get to my only Tim G readings session this trip. There's something very special about doing the readings with the India family every morning. The time has changed now as Tim and Sarah drop Maggie at work before starting readings.
Monday was spent preparing for the following 2 weeks. Going to the tailor, repacking, and Elle and I decided that the mission flat was in no state for new inductee's so we made the trip to Big Bazaar (on the way I showed her Mischief's which has changed it's name to something I can't now remember) and proceeded to buy things like plates, bowls, utensils, cleaning equipment, etc. It was such a good thing knowing that what we were doing was going to benefit many in the time to come GW.
Got back with minutes to spare to get luggage in the bus and leave for the station. Tim had thankfully given us a half an hour earlier time, so although we were stressing, the group - Leah, Cals, Kate, Tim, Ness & I made it on time. Elle had decided to stay behind for a couple of extra days in Hyd to CLEAN the flat, and then to spend some induction time with Ruth and Sarah when they arrived.

The group split at 12am at Rajahmundry station. Tim and Ness stayed on the train till Srik to meet up with Dad and Mum, and Cals, Kate, Leah and I got out and were met by Andrew Johnson and Praveen, Sirisha and Pretty.
Cals and Kate spent the week with Andrew and Shubs at Kadium (which i hadn't realised was so close) and Leah and I spent one night with them before being whisked off to spend a day with Praveen and Sirisha in their new abode in Rajahmundry.
Although it was only one night. It was so good to spend time seeing Shubha in her new home with her in-laws. I know she really appreciated the visit.
Little Prisca is now being called Pretty is a very Indian fashion and i'll post some photo's as soon as I get to an internet connection (probly home) where I can sit down and download them. She's wicked and gorgeous and I still love her to pieces. It was great to spend some time with them both, and find out exactly what the new situation was. Joythi also popped in for some time in the afternoon, and came with us to the 1st Birthday party of little John Thomas (Shubha's sister in Law's kid) that evening.
Exactly 24 hours later Leah and I were getting on the same train to take us further north.
6 hours later we were getting off at Srikakulam station...having spent the previous 3 nights on trains!!!