Hello everyone,
I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and are excited as the Christmas season starts. I'm seeing a lot of Christmas decoration happening via Facebook, but I haven't seen too much holiday cheer in Kolkata.
I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and are excited as the Christmas season starts. I'm seeing a lot of Christmas decoration happening via Facebook, but I haven't seen too much holiday cheer in Kolkata.
| It's been a long time since my last email home, but I'll try my best to recap the last few weeks. Aakash and I spent a few days in Chennai. In addition to vacationing, Aakash met with a mridangam (south Indian double barrel drum) player he knows from the US who was in town (short video here.) We stayed in a lovely hotel that included an incredible all you can eat south Indian breakfast. We hired a driver one day and drove to Mahabalipuram, a city on the coast about 60 km south of Chennai. This area is known for it's stone carved temples, and we enjoyed visiting a few right on the beach. We also visited Dakshina Chitra, which was basically a south Indian Williamsburg. They had models of old homes and occupations found in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, and Kerala and we saw some artists, including a sari spinner, doing their thing. |   |
My favorite part of our day trip was going to Crocodile Bank, which was basically a crocodile, turtle, and snake zoo. We were able to see them feed Jaws, a 16 foot crocodile (the largest gator in captivity). He's only fed once a week, and it was crazy to see this tiny Indian man taunting and throwing him meat out of a bucket. Seriously wild.
Afterwards, we took a six hour train to Bangalore. It was the first long distance train Aakash had been on and we spent most of the trip standing at the open door watching the scenery pass by. Bangalore was wonderful. We stayed with my cousin Pranu (my dad's younger brother's daughter) and her husband and three kids. It was a very relaxing few days- we mostly stayed near the house except for a few excursions into the city with the family or Bakunana. I stayed a day later than Aakash and was able to see a little bit of the kids' choir concert.
Coming back to Kolkata very much felt like coming home. It was nice to have so many projects and friends to come back to, although things were immediately busy. Aakash started daily rehearsals for the Kolkata jazz festival while I met and interviewed with Dolna Day School, a pre-preschool through class XII school nearby. Aakash's performance at Jazz Fest was a huge hit. You can see a great photo and some wonderful quotes here: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1131204/jsp/t2/story_17639614.jsp#.UqBtUGQW1gJ He performed on the Saturday, which was definitely the most attended evening of the three day festival. In addition to his normal guitar/bass/drum group, Payton, an American Fulbrighter studying Indian vocals in Bhopal, played vibraphone. They played Aakash's entire Ocean album with Payton playing Ron Miles' trumpet part. Aakash also asked me to sing on one tune (wahoo!) which was both an honor and just plain fun. Who knew I would to moving to India would expand my jazz improvisational skills?
As for me, I started teaching at Dolna Day School. I'm working three days a week (Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays) although they've made it clear I can work more if I'd like. The school is very close to our house. I walk 3-5 minutes to an auto stand where I catch an auto to the other side of a flyover, which takes another 3-5 minutes. I'm mostly teaching singing, although it seems like I have a lot of freedom and liberty to do what I want. Right now, the big push is getting the junior choir (around twelve 9-11 year olds) and senior choir (around forty 12-17 year olds) ready for the Christmas Fete where they'll be singing carols. I see each choir every day I'm there. I've never taught in a school where an all school event is centered around Christmas and we're actually encouraged to sing carols. I also see the younger classes once a week, beginning with the three year olds. The class sizes are enormous. There are about 60 three year olds, and the other classes comprise of at least forty students. Most classes are very well behaved and come with their classroom teacher, which will probably be helpful as the novelty of me wears off. I feel fortunate to have found such a pleasant school to work at and they're planning on performing The Wizard of Oz in May, so we'll start working on that in January.
Anyways, that's my update for now. This weekend Aakash is attending an all night classical Indian concert and his teacher's concert at a nearby auditorium. I'm going with a few friends to Sundarbans, a nearby mangrove forest/tiger preserve. Then, Aakash's mom arrives in Kolkata followed by my parents. It's hard to believe we've been living in India for over three months and it's already time for our folks to come visit! I hope you're staying warm wherever you are. (Indians have appropriately been busting out the wool scarves- it can get as cold as the mid-70's during the day!) Know that I miss you all and think of you often. Hope to catch up soon!
Love,
Jayanthi
Anyways, that's my update for now. This weekend Aakash is attending an all night classical Indian concert and his teacher's concert at a nearby auditorium. I'm going with a few friends to Sundarbans, a nearby mangrove forest/tiger preserve. Then, Aakash's mom arrives in Kolkata followed by my parents. It's hard to believe we've been living in India for over three months and it's already time for our folks to come visit! I hope you're staying warm wherever you are. (Indians have appropriately been busting out the wool scarves- it can get as cold as the mid-70's during the day!) Know that I miss you all and think of you often. Hope to catch up soon!
Love,
Jayanthi
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