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