Birthdays Plus

President Joseph had his 41st birthday on May 16 while his wife was in Bangalore enjoying cooler weather with relatives. He didn't want to celebrate alone so he brought a cake and invited a couple of people and we had a Happy Birthday for him at our apartment. The candle is quite clever, opening up when the center candle is lit after which it plays Happy Birthday incessantly. It was still playing the next morning when we put out the trash. Well wishers included Pavan who is secretly in love with Sravani, next to him, who is a sister to Deleep, next to her. We say "secretly" because Sravani let me know that not even her brother knows and in India it just isn't kosher to pay any attention to someone of the opposite sex. Since the population here is 1.1 billion, the arranged marriages seem to be working on that score but little else. As much as mother friends and I would sometimes commiserate, "Too bad we can't arrange a marriage for our children," we can see here that such uniting and all that goes with it is very detrimental in a score of ways.

First birthdays are a really big deal here--sort of a coming out party. This one is for Jason, son of Sangeetha and Praveen in 2nd Branch held on the roof of their apartment building. The little girl below on the right is the oldest child of President Vinod, 2nd Branch and her name is Karen. I'm running into more Karens in India than I've seen in my life.

Couldn't resist this picture of some of our favorite men all grouped together by chance between meetings. Hanok became familiar to us after his role as Brother Williams in the Christmas video. Rajesh is looking for a wife but afraid to follow the advice we gave him. He's the only member in his family and wants a good Mormon girl. Prahalad is 1st Branch mission leader and recently baptized his mother and cousin brother (cousins are called cousin brother or cousin sister). His mother can't speak English but was permitted to join because her two children are members. She is such a sweetheart. We always hug--our best way of communicating. Prahalad (we used to call him Rocky, his easy nickname) is taking piano. Rajesh you've seen before (married to Mary) has developed a close relationship with us for various reasons. He doesn't want it known and there are several Indian members who have discovered our blog and are reading it. Boddu is married to Vani (you've seen him too). He and Vani just learned she is pregnant which they have both yearned for for several years and plan a temple trip for sealing in the next few months. Boddu recently fixed our fan that had stopped working. Now we've got to ask him about our washing machine. Kishore is married to Padmaja and both are dear to us--both are strong and devoted.

More Activity Day

Golconda Fort was enough for one day for us but the Elders had three more places on their docket. India Gardens was the last where we could ride in an open train and observe the beauty. I couldn't imagine walking it by the end of the day. We had already walked a mile from the Tank Bund just to get to it. I was taking pictures out the side and this young Muslim lady kept smiling at me so I asked if I could take her picture. She seemed to nod but her boyfriend/husband (the fact that her face isn't covered indicates she is married but maybe he gave her permission to undrape) wasn't the least bit happy about it. Muslim women are much more friendly than the men but usually only when the men aren't around. Glad I got away with it. There were more interesting sites here but I didn't seem to get them pictured.

This Buddha statue is on a man-made island out in the Tank Bund Lake where Ganesh elephant idols are dunked, people commit suicide (Dad saw one such pulled out the other day.), and putrid aromas overwhelm passersby. I don't know why the Buddha is there because very few Indians are Buddhists.

We're on a kind of ferry boat headed out to the statue. We think lots of people go out there because there weren't any empty seats on our boat and they were making a mad dash for seats. The woman below wouldn't let me go through the ticket gate until I took her picture. She was all teeth when I showed it to her on my camera.

The second place we went to were tombs where famous people are buried. The cloth above is draped over the coffin inside the tomb to the right but we forget who it is--someone like the original Chief Minister of Hyderabad. There were about 12 or 15 all together, one for each person. When you're important in India, you're really important. For a stark contrast, I took a picture of the woman sweeping because we see women like this quite frequently, sweeping along the side of the roads and even the flyovers, stooped over with their little whisk brooms--such an insurmountable job with a ridiculously little tool. Sometimes they are on our lane early Sunday morning and they will always stop their work to beg from us. They probably make next to nothing.

Charminar

One Wednesday, supposed P-Day, we went to Charminar, an old Muslim structure that supposedly is connected by an underground tunnel to Golconda Fort which is quite a few miles away so it's hard to believe. Of all things, I didn't take a picture of Charminar from the outside. We had just been to LVPEI for eye checkups and our eyes were dilated and it was so hot and sunny that my eyes were continually filled with water and sweat and I wasn't thinking very straight. The structure to the right is not unlike Charminar except that Charminar can't be driven through but it is empty in the middle. Don't know what sense that makes.

Since we have been back, we been told by numerous people that we shouldn't have gone because it's an unsafe Muslim area. We didn't feel safe while there and were happy to leave but only after we had done a little shopping on the streets much to Bill's disdain. He finally escaped to the cab and waited to avoid all the beggars.

Here maybe you can tell that it is a round structure with no middle. We had to climb narrow, winding, uneven stairs to get up to this area which is the only part with interesting design.

I decided to post our Charminar experience because it was just recently in the news. A young woman plunged to her non-immediate death a couple days ago. Reports were varied, including suicide. But the final story is that her boyfriend was angry with her for her inability to continue to pay excessive interest on a loan of money he had made to her, so he took her up on top of Charminar and pushed her off. She survived a while, even talked on the way to the hospital. The doctor there said she had lost a lot of blood so we figure that was the reason for her death. Other than that, she had only some broken bones in her limbs. They don't have much blood here for transfusions. We felt so bad for her. She was a beautiful and sweet-looking female with a maniacal boyfriend. Charminar has apparently been a spot for other suicides. We will not be returning even for a picture of the outside.

Golconda Fort

On activity day in April we went to Golconda Fort, one of India's most famous built by Muslims, some say in the 1500s. To climb to the top is 280 or 360 steps or some humongous number. Detours dot the way but we saw plenty just sticking to the stairs. One dungeon area that we went through was filled with bats so I wasn't very interested in exploring other such areas.

This is the top. We went inside and climbed some stairs but outside is where we took the pictures of us and other landscapes, including Hyderabad. It was hot and we did our usual sweating.

I lost several pictures trying to move these together but guess you get the idea. It's huge. A five mile wall surrounds it. We're glad we went but as with most things, once is enough for the non-adventurous duo.