more on Ooty

This is very disappointing. I took a rickshaw all by myself all the way across town to the only internet cafe that allows me to use a USB port and upload pictures and, of course, it is not working today. That is what we have come to call "totally India". Things just rarely go according to plan. Buses break down, luggage gets lost, schools change their schedules, something you thought was safe to eat....wasn't. I am learning lessons in being flexible, because that is the only way we are going to be productive here.

I digress. More on Ooty:

This past weekend gave me a look into the family structure in India. As I mentioned, we went with a friend, Neely and visited with his huge extended family. He has three uncles that all live together in Ooty, as well as an aunt that lives in Pennsylvania. Neelys family moved to Arizona before he was born, but the rest of the family live together there. Not only are they very close and all business owners, the three uncles and their families all live on the same [massive] tract of land in the outskirts of town.


The first uncle, who we call "First Uncle" has the largest and nicest house and he and his family fed us breakfast the first day we were there. He is the one who opened the first and only private hospital in town. He is an ophthalmologist and his wife works there as well, she is a gynecologist. He took us on a tour of the small hospital; it wasn't much bigger than some churches but we could see the crowds outside and some of the patients inside and its clear the work they do is vital to the town. Also the daughter-in-law of First Uncle opened a spa there, which we visited. It is connected to the hospital and we all got a few treatments during our spare time (I got the nicest and most inexpensive mani/pedi of my life :)

Since there were around 15 of us there Friday morning, we ate at First Uncles house traditional Indian style...sitting around the floor eating with our hands, which I am liking more and more every day. It was also the nicest breakfast meal we have eaten yet, (only to be outdone by Second Uncle's breakfast the next day...). We had idly which are little rice pancakes that don't really have much flavor until you dip them into a sambar or chutney sauce that is made from coconut or lentils or something. We also had dosa, and these little friend doughnut things that remind me of southern hush puppies. We also had fruit, hard boiled eggs, chicken stew, and lots and lots of poori (fried bread used to dip in, well, anything). And as usual, the entire meal was followed by tea.

The Second Uncles house is right next door, he is the one who owns the tea factory if I remember correctly. The houses are just a few steps away yet they have their own household of cooks and drivers etc. They also share a little garden and greenhouse and balcony that looks over a cliff down into the town.

Third Uncle and his family live in a smaller house behind the first two and the last day we were there, the family served us a massive crab buffet with rice and chicken and fruit, which we also ate with our hands, sitting around the floor. (There is a girl on our trip from Maryland, probably less then five feet tall and usually a dainty eater. But when they brought out the crab, she put away more seafood than I have ever seen in my life).
This particular Uncle works in real estate and I believe his son (Neely cousin) is the one who own a hotel in Ooty, which we got to visit and enjoy another meal there.

Another interesting thing about meals and Indian hospitality; the entire family helps serve the guests. The Anand family seemed to have a houseful of cooks and cleaners and yet the father and all the sons still served us. They kept coming around the circles of eaters offering us more food and refilling our water and making sure we had everything we could possibly want.




BTW, Any hope of me shedding pounds in India has gone OUT THE WINDOW!!


We are all soooo envious of Neely; he gets to come here in the summers and live as the 'Prince of Ooty' and enjoy all the food and weather and amazingly hospitable and interesting family. Our group openly did not want to return to humid and stinky Chennai, and for a while, we thought we weren't going to have to. At some point our travel agent, who booked our train tickets, called to inform us that we were actually still on the waiting list for the train to get us back home (somehow she failed to mention this before we left for the weekend....). We got excited about the thought of being "stuck" in Ooty for one more night, but instead we just had to split up and take several buses back to Chennai.

[hiking in Ooty. Me, Deepa, Kaylee, Ruchi]

Also: I definitely left my Indian cell phone back in Ooty. To be specific, I left it at a boathouse on the shore of a lake and when I went back for it, it was gone. If anyone had my number, don't bother calling it. I'll update if I get a new phone, but its not likely because I'll have to pay 1200 Rupees for it.

-S