Visak

In Visak, there was a little time to rest before it was time to head out to a house warming feast. They go all out, any opportunity they're given to celebrate:-)
Babji's wife Esther was very supportive... she sat next to me, the men all facing our row of women, and mostly everyone ate in silence. We were given big banana leaves, and banana's and Indian sweets, and then they started to pile the rice and curries on... I tried my best to get a Kunchem amount, but it was hard as they loaded up while I was saying my prayer!!

I can't eat rice quickly, and did my best to get through the great quantities of foreign food, and then Babji was saying to me, we have to go, there are other people waiting downstairs to take your chair. Thankfully I took my banana as it seemed to be the thing to do, and left. Wish I'd known beforehand that we were all eating in shifts.

Esther took her son Elisha and dissapeared to visit friends in the area, as they used to live there, leaving Babji and I to go and visit Samuel at LV Nagar. He's decorating the hall, preparing for his son Samson's wedding next month. Hung out there for a bit as there was also a lady contact there who was interested in who I was, and asked all the usual questions.

My main purpose in visiting visak was to see if I could catch up with Santoshi, Sheila, Sunitha & Syam.

Santoshi is living & studying in a hostel in Karkinada, Sunitha I had no address for, and apparently Syam and his wife are living in Hyderabad. So Monday afternoon Babji and I head out to visit Sheila. She was excited to see me and decided that I should stay for dinner and the night.

The next morning she asked permission to have the morning off school (she's well again, minus a cough and is teaching 6 days a week) and we went to the internet to set up another email id for her and iway account. Before we left we had a surprise visit from Syam who had arrived a couple of days earlier to take a month of exams to complete his MBA.

Unfortunately, Babji didn't get this message. I'm not sure why, somewhere in all the translating there was a communication breakdown so when I got back to the flat after taking lunch, he was a little upset. I can understand why, if there was an Indian sister in Australia, I'd feel the same way, thankfully he understood. Was just worried because people were calling him asking to speak to me, and he couldn't tell them where I was.

Having found out the train times, I decided I should catch an earlier train to Rajahmundry so as to not arrive there too late. Of course, I've been told they leave frequently, but at this time, only every two hours...and I have 30 mins to get to the station that is an hour away. No problem sister, just catch an auto to the station that is closer to here.

Babji again was my escort, he was saying that he'd taken over looking after the westerners from Phanni and he'd been doing it for 18 months now. Amazing how things change so much.

It was a gorgeous ride to the station as the sun was so bright in the sky and was shining through the palm tree's. The sun is setting about 4:30 here and it get's redder and redder before it dissapears completely.

I didn't have a reserved ticket, as it was so hard to book seats when I was able to finally sort out an itinerary in Hyd, so I got on sleeper class with no reservation and payed the TT for an upgrade.

Travelling alone, I seem to attract Catholic sister's. This first time they were 'Sisters of Charity' and seemed to enjoy the fact that I was reading my bible next to them. One of them asked quite a few questions, and showed me all her photo's of her studying, and becoming a sister, and I realised that they go through the same phases of marriage, to become a sister, but they're giving their life to the Lord and not to a man. Interesting.