A came to get Ci and I in the morning, we hadn’t had breakfast but I really wanted to get our visit to the NIA (National Institute of Ayurveda) out of the way. It was bound to take a while. When we got there, despite A being local, there was no actual meeting set up, he just had the name of someone who might be able to help. We spent about an hour wondering through hospital corridors, past classrooms and empty rooms. It’s strange, no mater where you are in the world, when you are in a hospital, if you stand still and smell, you can tell you are in a hospital – they always smell the same.
Eventually we stumbled upon someone who could at least talk to us. It was so strange the Indian doctor was speaking English and Ci was speaking English but Ci could not understand him and he could not understand her, to the point that he asked if she spoke English? I ended up translating between Indian English and Chinese English and realised that Ci wasn’t entirely sure herself of what she needed, which made me feel much more reassured in concerns with my project. This doctor eventually gave up and passed us onto a female doctor who thought she might be able to get hold of some data for Ci. It was time to leave.
We were so hungry, the next plan was to go meet the boys for lunch but when we called then they were already eating, we thought this meant A would bring us straight to a restaurant. It didn’t. We ended up at a house, we were rather confused, until he disclosed that it was the house of an esteemed producer of ayurvedic drugs. We waited around in silence for a while and were informed we were waiting for his niece who was a student of ayuverda in Bangalore. Whilst we were waiting we were given bright green lemonade and some vegetarian puff pastries, which were a welcome relief to our aching stomachs.
Meeting his niece was both amazing and frustrating. She helped me so much with my project and was so enthusiastic about ayurveda, I was really impassioned about my project after meeting her. I was frustrated as it became apparent just how limited Cis English was and I ended up not only having to explain many simple concepts, but taking notes too – that was not the deal, to write two projects out here – grrr.
When that was over we joined the boys again, at first I though they were going to go off and meet with government officials, but as we had commissioned the car for the whole day A thought it might be nice for us to do some sight seeing. So we went to see a ……you guessed it….fort!! This was made a bit more interesting with the encounter of a lone French traveller, who was also a budding artist. He had only a disposable Minnie mouse camera with him, instead of worrying about taking pictures of the places he visited he drew them into a small book he carried in a plastic bag, held together with rope. I thought it was a great idea to keep the memories alive.
After the fort we got driven to what we thought was a restaurant but ended up being As house. At first I thought it was planned and that he was actually having us for dinner but it turns out he just wanted us to meet his family and we drank rose water – an amazing drink. Then he sent us on our way to the restaurant. It was great, they had traditional music and everyone was in traditional Rajasthani dress. The food was a mass of small dishes of various regional dishes, most of which were actually not to my liking, but my smile returned with the dessert as my favourite sickly, sweet, crispy, fried yumminess of Indian pretzels appeared.
Once dinner was over we were free to explored the wonderland of the complex. There were dancers, Ci and I were taken up on stage to dance with them – mortifying, I am so the least easy-going, flexible, on-the-spot dancer ever!! Oh well, really need to take those lessons when I get back. We also tried the human powered big wheel. It was smaller than some big wheels but big enough for me. As it was man-powered they had to sort balance out and I ended up on my own, it was a rather scary few rounds, especially when I got stopped right at the top whilst they let Ci and Ch out.
Eventually we stumbled upon someone who could at least talk to us. It was so strange the Indian doctor was speaking English and Ci was speaking English but Ci could not understand him and he could not understand her, to the point that he asked if she spoke English? I ended up translating between Indian English and Chinese English and realised that Ci wasn’t entirely sure herself of what she needed, which made me feel much more reassured in concerns with my project. This doctor eventually gave up and passed us onto a female doctor who thought she might be able to get hold of some data for Ci. It was time to leave.
We were so hungry, the next plan was to go meet the boys for lunch but when we called then they were already eating, we thought this meant A would bring us straight to a restaurant. It didn’t. We ended up at a house, we were rather confused, until he disclosed that it was the house of an esteemed producer of ayurvedic drugs. We waited around in silence for a while and were informed we were waiting for his niece who was a student of ayuverda in Bangalore. Whilst we were waiting we were given bright green lemonade and some vegetarian puff pastries, which were a welcome relief to our aching stomachs.
Meeting his niece was both amazing and frustrating. She helped me so much with my project and was so enthusiastic about ayurveda, I was really impassioned about my project after meeting her. I was frustrated as it became apparent just how limited Cis English was and I ended up not only having to explain many simple concepts, but taking notes too – that was not the deal, to write two projects out here – grrr.
When that was over we joined the boys again, at first I though they were going to go off and meet with government officials, but as we had commissioned the car for the whole day A thought it might be nice for us to do some sight seeing. So we went to see a ……you guessed it….fort!! This was made a bit more interesting with the encounter of a lone French traveller, who was also a budding artist. He had only a disposable Minnie mouse camera with him, instead of worrying about taking pictures of the places he visited he drew them into a small book he carried in a plastic bag, held together with rope. I thought it was a great idea to keep the memories alive.
After the fort we got driven to what we thought was a restaurant but ended up being As house. At first I thought it was planned and that he was actually having us for dinner but it turns out he just wanted us to meet his family and we drank rose water – an amazing drink. Then he sent us on our way to the restaurant. It was great, they had traditional music and everyone was in traditional Rajasthani dress. The food was a mass of small dishes of various regional dishes, most of which were actually not to my liking, but my smile returned with the dessert as my favourite sickly, sweet, crispy, fried yumminess of Indian pretzels appeared.
Once dinner was over we were free to explored the wonderland of the complex. There were dancers, Ci and I were taken up on stage to dance with them – mortifying, I am so the least easy-going, flexible, on-the-spot dancer ever!! Oh well, really need to take those lessons when I get back. We also tried the human powered big wheel. It was smaller than some big wheels but big enough for me. As it was man-powered they had to sort balance out and I ended up on my own, it was a rather scary few rounds, especially when I got stopped right at the top whilst they let Ci and Ch out.
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