Dear Family & Friends:

Last weekend was great. Saturday Mom and I went down to the Charminar for some light shopping. We drove around the Charminar a couple of times, but didn’t climb it, it was raining pretty good. We bought some purses, some bangles (bracelets), and mom bought a metal lunch box thingie that everyone uses here. When we were buying the lunch box the shop guy asked mom where she was from, she said the US. He asked if she would like the lunch box engraved with her name, she said, “sure.” So he engraved it with her name, and then wrote “USA” under it. She said, “You should have written India.” He said, “US/India, it’s the same thing.” That made me smile.

We bought Claire a purse and some bangles. Claire had confiscated a purse from another little girl in our apartment complex and loved playing with it, so we decided she needed one of her own. The one we got her is pink with little flowers on it, she loves it and walks around saying, “burse, burse, burse” all of the time. It took some convincing in order to get her to wear her bangles, but she will wear them for a limited amount of time now. Most of the time she keeps them in her “burse.”

We also went to a shopping center called the “Big Bazaar” where they have a 99rupee store. This is India’s equivalent to the dollar store, but it’s actually the “2 dollar store” because of the conversion rate.

Saturday night Clay and I went out with some friends Ranjit and Chitra. Chitra is of Indian origin, but has always lived in the US, Ranjit has been living outside of India for the last 10 years. They have an 8 year old son and a 7 month old daughter. We went to their house for a while, then went to a Thai restaurant in the Taj Banjara. The food was great. After dinner we went to a lake called Durgumcheru Lake, it’s also called “the secret lake.” We hung out, listened to some music and enjoyed the view.

So that all was the good part of our weekend. Sunday during the day mom and I went to several book stores. Mom bought lots of books for her classes and we got Claire a new train and some big Lego type things. That same day Clay woke up sick and was sick all Sunday and some of Monday. No fun. He slowly got better throughout the week. We are full strength now.

We are experiencing quite a different July-August from those of our past in Nebraska. We have a washing machine, but no cloths dryer. So after we wash our cloths we hang them on cloths lines that Clay has so eloquently attached to our balconies. The first month that we were here our cloths would dry within 2-3 hours. Now it is taking 4 days and they are still damp.

Today one of the Kenexa drivers invited us to his wedding on August 18th. We are so excited!

Claire’s new words:
Rinusis (Rhinoceros)
Burse (Purse)
Ekaky (Exactly)

My new words:
Plaità Braid
Ear Budà Q Tip

This weekend we are headed to some film studios close by Hyderabad and hopefully to the zoo if it’s not raining. Sunday night we are having the helpdesk over to our house for dinner.

I’ll write more next week!


Sincerely,Julianna EhlersKenexa

Cool link I found today... It is some guys resume.
http://213.186.36.10/~al/alstudio/cv/en.htm

Guess what?
We have gates!!!! I feel like I just won the Publisher's Clearinghouse Sweepstakes...I never thought it could happen to us.

They are really beautiful, I could not have made them nearly as nice. Straight, square, stiff, and the wood matches well.

ttfn, cse.

Dear Family and Friends,
Wow! This week has gone by quickly.

Saturday morning we headed out for Chennai and went directly to Muttukadu where we spent 2 days on the beach. It was VERY hot and sticky, we were definitely empathizing with everyone enjoying the Nebraska summer. During our stay in Muttukadu we visited a Crocodile zoo and a Hindu Temple in Mamallapuram called the “Shore Temple.” We took lots of good pictures that will be uploaded to the photo website this weekend. While we were staying at the hotel on the beach Clay and Claire went for a horse ride. Claire spotted the horse first. We were sitting down having breakfast and Claire broke out into hysterics, saying “horse, horse, horse” we didn’t know what she was talking about at first until she got our attention pointed at the horse trotting down the beach. Clay negotiated with the guy riding the horse and off they went. Our hotel was located next to “Dizzee World” the “best amusement park in South India” or so they said. We didn’t have a chance to visit, but it looked quite interesting.

We did some shopping in Chennai. I bought some shirts and a new set of sheets with some cool elephants on them. We also bought some shoes. Clay did some good negotiations here. He negotiated from 450 rupees to 125 rupees for one pair ($3.00). Still probably more than an Indian national would pay, but it still felt good, and hey it was only $3.00.

Claire and mom had their first auto rickshaw drive in Chennai. It’s definitely a sight seeing the 4 of us in the back of one of these suckers! We’ll be sure to include a picture of an auto rickshaw for those of you who haven’t seen one before.

Clay and I attended the annual NASSCOM (National Association for Software Services Companies) conference while we were in Chennai. It was interesting, we learned several things, but mostly did a lot of networking. We were there with the Director of Sales for Kenexa in Hyderabad, Harish. We learned that companies in India have been complaining to Universities that the graduates they are turning out aren’t of the caliber that the companies need. So there was a lot of discussion on what needs to be done to create new curriculum in schools in order to turn out IT grads with different skills. They also spoke about the fear that China will soon be taking the IT market that India has built, so there was a lot of discussion about not letting that happen. The conference was filled with panels, Q&A sessions, and keynote speakers. I will share one interesting experience: After one of the panels, an audience member stood up to ask a question. He began his question with this statement, “HR should be the mother of the organization. Not an American mother, but an Indian mother…” I was starting to nod off at that point, but he brought me back. I took a bit of offense to that statement as did many other India women sitting in the audience. It’s interesting that an “HR consultant” would make such a statement. Oh well, that shows that there are odd ducks all over the world.

Claire came back from the long weekend looking like Rocky at the end of a fight. She has a bruise on her right cheek from falling while climbing some stairs, she has a scratch on the bridge of her nose from who knows what, and she fell from a small ledge cutting her tongue/lip/gum we don’t know which because she wouldn’t let us look in her mouth, but blood was coming out. Nevertheless, she seems to be really happy. The scary part is, even after she hurts herself and is crying she gets right back on whatever it was that she got hurt on. I feel the gray hairs coming on already.

Claire’s new words:
Doodles (Noodles)
Doodoo (Cock-a-doodle-doo)
Barga (Bargya-our new maid/nanny)
Maga (Grandma)
Brush
Upee (Up)
Off (Off, on, out, down, etc.)
Hot, hot, hot (in general this means something is painful, whether it is really hot, spicy, cold, etc.)
Mango, mango, mango (This means mango, but evidently she can’t just say it once)

If you remember in an email a couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that when you ask Claire what a horse says, she’ll say “horse.” She has now graduated to saying “neigh.” I’m a proud mama
J

I am craving Taco Inn.

No big deal, just thought you might all be interested.

Family and Friends,
This email will be short, as we have been keeping up on the blog throughout the week, so we don’t have a lot of new information. Here are a few updates:

-Still no baby gates
-We are going to Chennai tomorrow and will be there until Wednesday night. We will stay in Mutukadu Saturday and Sunday, doing the tourist thing. Then Monday we will travel to Chennai and will be attending a HR conference put on by Nasscom on Tuesday and Wednesday. (To my friends from India-If you have any tourist suggestions, please let me know. Right now we have VTI and Pondicherry on the list)

Observation:
When people ask us where we are from and we say “United States” or “The US” or “The States” often times we receive blank stares, but if we say “America” everyone understands. I thought this was worth pointing out, because if we were in the US, Canada, or Latin American and said we were from “America” we would probably be stoned or at least chastised for referring to the US as “America.”

Best name of the day:
venkateswaran anantharaman

Best email of the day:

Hi Clay,

Please do the needful.




--that was the entire message on a forwarded email.

Quote of the day:
"If I am not there, I wont be here."

We received a couple inquiries as to the explanation the carpenter gave for not fixing everything. His explanation was that “the sun wasn’t out.”

…Interesting

More news to come later…
Jules

7.13.05 Jules and I just got back from a very nice lunch with a friend. We thought it was just a chance to meet and eat with his parents, but it was something more, something quite moving and an interesting cultural experience.
He lost his wife 45 days ago and it is customary to have dinner with another couple on the 45th day of being widowed.
They also had a place setting for recently departed filled for her. Evidently this gets fed to a cow at the end of the day.
I am not up to speed on the specifics of goal of having this dinner, but felt honored that he asked us.

Made me think about people we have lost in our lives, it is good to stop and remember.

07.13.2005 Hello Friends and Family,

All is still going well. I have enclosed a few updates in this email, but most of the updates are in our new blog at http://ehlersindia.blogspot.com/
We posted all of our emails up to this point and Clay just posted some nice commentary on bugs, surprise, surprise. So be sure to check it out. We will be journaling on the blog periodically and will probably send emails a little less frequently. Also, we have added more pictures to the website and will continue to update often.

Interesting Experience:
We contracted with a carpenter to do some work in the apartment. Install door stoppers so our doors don’t slam shut every time a breeze comes through the flat, install a couple of curtain rods (we have nowhere to hang clothes right now), and to install 2 baby gates (one at the bottom of the stairs, one at the top).
It was all supposed to be done last Wednesday, then it was supposed to be done last Friday, Monday we heard that it’s not done because it rained on Saturday. On Monday they said everything would be done on Tuesday. The carpenter came on Tuesday and installed half of the doorstoppers, nothing else.

7.13.2005 Favorite statment by friend yet today:
"Questions are never crazy."
"Answers are crazy."

7.11.2005 A few random thoughts on bugs (yes, this one is from Clay).
-->We thought that the onset of the monsoons would bring a bunch more mosquitoes -- wrong, it brought flies.
-->Indian flies are small, slow, and surprisingly dumb. They also bite Joyce and no one else.
-->Indian mosquitoes are small, quiet, extremely stealthy, and smart as a whip. They also do not seem to care if you have DEET or not.
-->Bug screens, regardless of how tightly fitting they look--they are not.
-->I just got back from camping, and out in the woods there are no mosquitoes--on the 4th floor in our apartment, tons.
-->Brought home a millipede that was about 6 inches long from camping, he was hiding in my dirty laundry found him today. That one freaked Joyce out.
-->There is some kind of trichopteran migration taking place in our flat, they are coming in by the dozen (and these are big suckers), harmless, but big.
-->OK, now the next day (12th) Went for a walk around the apartment complex and the trichopterans are dead all over the street, by the millions. Many of them are have been torn from their wings and the wings are blowing around like leaves on a fall day. –I have a few theories about what is going on with this, but will not bore you unless you want to get my thoughts.
-->I have seen no spiders.
--> Our apartment seems to be ant free, but I see them in almost all the other structures we go into—especially the cabin in the woods. They do not seem to bother anyone and no one bothers them—nature’s vacuum cleaners.
-->Walking sticks are cool—and they really look like sticks.
-->Found a little red (bright red) insect Sunday, maybe twice the size of a lady bug, but they have a soft velvety coating instead of hard shell (looks like a coleopteran, feels like a velvet sponge.
-->Found a big yellow moth that had a wingspan greater than the width of my hand.

OK, that is enough for now.
Clay

7.8.2005

Dear Family and Friends,

As I am sitting here typing this email at the office in the dark (the power is out), it reminded me to say how grateful we are for our back up generator in our apartment complex, the power went out at least 5 times yesterday. It reminds me of life in Mexico, I remember studying for finals by candlelight because the power would go out so often.
This solves a mystery for us. We thought our washing machine was broken, it would randomly stop on certain cycles either leaving our clothes soapy or soaking wet. We couldn’t figure it out, until yesterday we realized that it would stop mid cycle when the power would go out then it wouldn’t start again. Mystery solved!

Friday we went to a party at our friend Subir’s house. Yum, Yum, Yummy! Lot’s of great foods, especially meats. We had wild boar, goat intestines (I didn’t try that one), some chicken, and miscellaneous sausages. We also experienced a new spiced rum called “Old Monk” very nice. Claire made friends with Shiv’s (another co-worker) son, Piyush. He is about 3 years old and she had a blast getting chased around by him. She was up 3 hours past her bed time at this party, so she was a little delirious. She also gave him forehead kisses, and he would promptly “wipe them off.” (See recently uploaded pictures to the website.)

Sunday 3 kids came up to us at church and asked what Claire’s name was. I said Claire, and then they ran off. They came back 5 minutes later and wanted to know if her name was “Clear.” (Her name is a difficult one here) Then they asked if she was a boy or a girl (this is a common question about Claire). We couldn’t understand for the longest time why people would ask if a girl dressed in pink was a girl or not. It’s quite obvious for us. Now we know that she doesn’t have the cultural gender identifiers, Bindi, Anklet, Earrings, Bangles, etc. for a girl. The color of clothes has no bearing on gender here. Now we know! Unfortunately she won’t keep her anklets on, so we are going to try bangles and see if that works. Saturday a friend put a bindi on her and she was ok with that, so we might try that too. I’m just not up for piercing her ears at this age.

Interesting experience:
Last Saturday night as our driver was leaving to go home, he asked Clay what time he should be at our flat Sunday morning. Clay said 7:30am, he hesitated for a moment, then said, “yes sir” and left. Clay and I both looked at each other thinking he wasn’t ok with that, but didn’t say anything, so we assumed all was good.
Sunday morning at 8:15, there was still no sign of Shah. He came up around 8:30am, and we left. He didn’t say anything about being late all day. Sunday night as he was leaving Clay told him next Sunday, when he says 7:30am he means 7:30am. Shah said he left his house at 6:30am, but there were no autos (taxis) running at that hour, so he had to walk the whole way to our apartment (6-7 kilometers), which is why it took him 2 hours to get there. Clay said, “You have to tell me the next time there is something you know that I don’t” (like the fact that autos aren’t available that early on a Sunday.) He said, “But sir, how can I?”
This is a perfect example of how employees will never say, “no” to an employer. We are learning, slowly, but surely.

Claire’s Corner:
Claire got a new pink car with a horn on Saturday (birthday present from Grandma Clyde). It’s her most favorite toy right now, check out the pictures.

She also experienced her first ear infection and her first trip to the doctor’s office in India. All in all it was a pretty good experience. Definitely no HIPPA laws here, they gave me a piece of paper to fill out about Claire, basic information, but they gave me some guy’s medical chart (instead of a clipboard or a book) as something hard to write on. Wow, can we say law suit in the US?
Anyhoo, it was very clean and we got in on time. Actually I called at 9:00 to get an appointment at 11:00, but Claire was still napping at 10:30 and I didn’t want to wake her up since she wasn’t feeling well, so I called back and was able to reschedule at 12:00. We were in with the doctor by 12:05. He was a very nice man, Dr. Swaroop. He was trained in the UK and has been back in India for 6-7 years practicing here. Claire did NOT want him to look in her ears.
The doctor’s visit cost 250 rupees (about $6), he prescribed amoxicillin for 7 days and some cream for her nasty diaper rash, the total pharmacy bill was 227 rupees (about $5). The amoxicillin came in a powder form and we had to mix it with water and make the solution ourselves. Luckily it has a citrus flavor so Claire doesn’t fight it too much.

Be sure to check out the photo album again, it’s been updated with a 3rd Album.
Go to http://www.clubphoto.com/
In the field in the middle of the page type Clay’s personal email address:
claytman@excite.com

7.1.05
Hello friends and family! (sounds like a MCI commercial)

The monsoon is here! How refreshing. Love the rain, hate the mosquitoes that come with it. We are well armed with our “plug in the wall” magic mosquito repellant devices in each bedroom and Claire has a mosquito net over her crib.

Ok…we found a restaurant last night for dinner that serves the best beef ever! Ok, maybe it’s not the best beef, but boy was it tasty to us! It’s a place called Fusion 9. Definitely the most expensive place so far, but the 3 of us had drinks, ate nice dinners with 2 appetizers for $35. Not too bad. Definitely would have been more expensive at home, but to give you a comparison, we have been eating out at Indian restaurants (fabulous meals) for about $5 a piece. What a life!

We have an exciting weekend ahead of us.
Friday night we are going to Subir’s house (one of the sales guys here) for dinner and general libations. He is a Sikh so we are sure to have some good meatJ There will be lots of other kids there, so Claire should have a good time. We will be sure to take the camera.
Saturday our college professor friend, Aishwini and his wife Uma may bring their daughters to our apartment for a swim. We are also planning on checking out some bookstores and one of our co-workers (Anupama) may come over to teach me how to make Gulab Jammuns (our favorite desert here).
Sunday several help desk team members and some guys from the marketing team are going to teach us how to play cricket (well, they are teaching Clay and I am tagging along.)

New Claire stuff:
Q: What does a cow say?
A: Moo
Q: What does a sheep say?
A: Baa
Q: What does a horse say?
A: Horse (I really did mean to type horse here)
Pure geniusJ

Oh yeah…she also bit into my deodorant this morningJ


Quote from an anonymous Hyderbadian-
Clay Q: What is going on?
Anonymous A: Everything is as it is.

We miss you!

Jules, Clay, Claire, and Joyce