Copenhagen

We have put up some of our antique (or antique-like) maps back up in the den. A nice addition is the city map of Copenhagen, given to us by our friends Tørsten and Katrine.

This morning, Aidan asked Tara what the maps were. The first is Bermuda, where we went on our honeymoon. Aidan asked if that was in Virginia (?). Then, the maps in the middle are of South Africa - one of the entire country right after the Boer War, the second of the path the trekkers took into the interior, which Tara described to Aidan as ".... that's where Lawrence is from." Finally, the map of Denmark. Jonah chimed in and said, "Where Vitus is from?"

So, there you have it. Good stuff.

Day 90

Ten more days for this blog. Let the countdown begin.

Visitors

Had dinner last night with Uncle Gerry and Aunt Sharron. Gerry is among the blog's most ardent followers, so I decided to make sure he had an appearance on it.

Nice seeing you guys!

Ashoka

Ashoka is one thing that reminds us of India. And we trained him to do something that is very Indian..... have a look.

Day 87

The sun will soon set on this blog.

This is a picture I took on a business trip to India in 2006, during my side trip to Kerala.

In case you missed it.....

.... here is the pretty picture of Tara.

Happy Birthday Tara!!

Tara's birthday was today....



^ I got her a small cake with candles that made a "41". Aidan took note off the fact that from where he sat it looked like 14. Small concession, since our eldest son is older than that. But Tara got carded the other day when buying some wine... which she really liked.



^ The boys assembled for mom to come downstairs.



^ Liam holding back a smile.



^ Tara was a ravishing beauty. I took her to a place she has always wanted to go, Barrington's Restaurant. It was excellent.

Our Place

So, you've seen segments of our house..... this is a tour of the whole thing.... in about one minute flat.

Just to accentuate the back yard shot, here is a still. Note the sun on the tree - it is from Goa. Isn't new grass great?

Day 83

OK, so we're almost ready to fade to black on this blog.

So, what did it all mean?

Yeah, like I can encapsulate that in a few sentences.....

We're pretty well adjusted back. We have the house looking ok, I have new grass coming in, we've connected with many friends, work is busy as can be (wow, like you wouldn't believe!) and Tara is going through the mechanics of life as a housewife in Charlotte, NC..... a role which suits he ok, but not like it used to.

In fact, the whole gig doesn't fit like it used to. This life in Charlotte, it is indeed a fine pair of shoes.... in fact, a life like we have is the envy of perhaps > 90% of the people on the earth..... and we know how to do this kind of life, it's like riding a bike....

But the reality is that something new has been planted and there is a need for us to deliberately nurture this new thing. We believe it is planted for a reason. Time will tell what that is. And the mechanics of this life here provides challenges to nurturing it.

I think. Still figuring it out....

Additionally, there is now a bit of a restlessness that won't be satisfied by this life. It's hard to explain, but we feel more *alive* when we are on the move, out of our element, learning new things, speaking in new tongues, tasting new foods, and trying to figure out just exactly how things work in a far-flung corner of the globe.

So, we're now looking for beautiful little threads as they show themselves. One has shown up, by all appearances. Tara has apparently hooked into a trip to Cameroon in early 2010 where she would do volunteer work in an AIDS orphanage. She would go with Abong, a woman from our church, as well as a few other friends from church. Not a "church sponsored" thing, but one that arose from people in common community.

Perhaps that is the best kind.

Her trip to Guatemala years ago was a huge event for her, transformative.

Well, with just a few days to go, I wanted to thank you for staying tuned in.... whoever you may be.

Bye for now....

Someone is 8!!

Jonah turned 8 years old today. He originally requested that we have a family dinner at Kabuto, one of those Japanese places that makes the food in front of you. Now, those can be nice - but this one isn't that nice. They throw a huge lump of margarine on the grill before they start doing the tricks with the knives and prawns. Long and the short of it - the image of the slathering margarine puddle really stays with you.

Thankfully, we gently asked if we could go to Luisa's instead. He consented. It was an awesome and enjoyable meal in a place we have gone now and again for about 15 years.

I like the snap above, as it shows Jonah angry about the fact that I brought him out for juice and he thought it would be a smoothie. In the environment he was in - it was that which upset him. India all around and he had a mundane concern.

What a great thing that was, to see his so truly adapted like that to something so foreign.

Party

Montibello has a monthly "Cocktail Club" that we have been attending for years. It was a great time, as always. Some snaps below.

And so ends...

....another week.

Today is day 80 of being back. 20 days to go beforte the blog fades to black.

Thursdays....

....are a time when we go to church for some family time and community, in the evening.



^ The young ones have a great time.



^ The entrance to the church.



^ The city is growing all around it. When built, it was a country church, 60 some years ago.

A facet of our repatriation.

Tag Sale

Tara's tag sale was last weekend, here are some pictures....



^ It was about five families involved, all at Sheri 's house.



^ Lots of people came, some before sunrise.



^ A snap of the crowd.



^ I have noticed this for a few years now - these sales are one way that Hispanics acquire articles of clothing and home furnishings. A good bit of Spanish was spoken that morning.

Jonah was an eager participant in the whole process.

Over all, Tara made a few hundred bucks.

Picture

Was processing some new pictures and found this one from the wine tasting we went to....

I posted it because it looks, very unintentionally, like there is an interrogation.

Day 76: As US life settles in....

.... it is fair to assume that we will learn some new things about ourselves, just as we did in India. The lessons are continuing, and I have discovered that I really find watching Aidan's baseball games incredibly enjoyable. It's such a rare commodity to have time where you don't have much to do except watch a game in front of you.

Certainly it is different because I have someone from my family playing. It is also different because no one is marketing a single item to me - there's no commercials, no advertisements behind the batting box..... just kids playing baseball.

Then, you have kids playing who you start to get to know - this one is not so solid as a thrower, another one is a great pitcher, a third is always trying to steal bases..... and on and on. Great stuff.

To know me is to know someone who generally has found the scale and depth of interest in sports a bit puzzling. At worst, I have thought it was counter-productive, with sports being simply a modern day form of the Roman "bread and circus".

I guess I am not overthinking this as much these days. I just really enjoyed watching that game last night.

They're undefeated.

Another thing that happened tonight was Liam started his swimming practices. Here's to hoping it becomes a positive outlet for him - I think it will!

It's day three of her sickness and Tara seems to be back in the saddle and generally healthy. She says we don't need to do anything to the house for a few days. This, too, is nice. 8)

Well, it happened.....

....Tara got sick from working too hard and resting too little. She is essentially immobilized and in bed. Not sure what the issue is, but it's not H1N1. It'd be worse than this.

Perhaps we need to give ourselves more time in terms of setting our lives back up here in the US?

Moving back

Hi, it's Liam, I hope everyone's doing well, I hope you'll take part in reading this piece I did on my prespective on the move back to the US.

India
1-One thing I enjoyed the most about India was that it was not suburban and boring like Charlotte, but that it was exotic, urban, and exciting. For example, I would see water buffalo and BMW's in the same area, just little things like that made the experience very interesting.
2-The one thing I loathed the most during my time in India was the lack of good infrastructure. For example, my house would suffer a power-cut in the middle of a sunny day for no reason, and I don't think I ever used my shower, due to it's lack of water or even hot water. Living in a third-world country was very difficult in this way, it's one thing I definitely don't miss in the least bit.

Charlotte
1 -Reflecting back on what you just read, you can probably conclude what I enjoy about being back in Charlotte and what I don't enjoy about being back in Charlotte. First, the infrastructure here is adequate, and I'm thankful for being able to take a long, hot shower. Second, the thing I don't enjoy is the boring atmosphere of this small, suburban metro. I overall am a big city person, and I prefer Hyderabad as my residence in the scenario of being here or there.

Wine Tasting

Day 73...

Last night we had a great time at our friends' home - David and Lynn. They hosted a charity wine tasting with Wine for Humanity. This org hosts wine tasting events and then let's you order some of the wines you had during the event. Then they give a portion of the proceeds to a charity of your choice.

David and Lynn chose The Society of Saint Andrew, a "gleaning" organization that recovers food that cannot/will not be harvested for whatever reason and gives it to the poor and hungry.

Didn't now anyone was even doing that. Wow.

The woman, Marilyn, who is one of three women who run the whole thing in Virginia, North and South Carolina, explained their approach and how they get things done. Totally inspiring. She also said that about 25% of the food produced in the US never makes it to market - for reasons of controlling the price, or farmers being unable/unwilling to complete a harvest, and because of perceived imperfections in the items (melons that are not the "standard size" for a supermarket, etc.).

She brought up a question that many in America have, but none of us were brave enough to ask - "If the poor are hungry, why are so many of them overweight?" She beat us to the punch and explained how many poor people live in what is called "a food desert", which is to say their part of town only has convenience stores which enables them to buy soda, candy, macaroni and cheese - essentially items that are high in sugar, fat and sodium. And many of them don't have vehicles to travel to the part of town where the abundance is.... essentially, where we live.

For a moment there, I got a clear glimpse of how things work in America and felt a little distrubed. It was a good day for reflecting on that - being 9/11 and all.

She said she is working to get a produce stand into the bus station in uptown Charlotte. Makes perfect sense.

This was one of the most interesting things we had heard of in a while and we were both really inspired. Great party, too!




^ Marilyn explaining things about the Society....



^ Marilyn and Debbie, the woman from Wine for Humanity



^ Ms. Marilyn



^ Orders were collected by Debbie.....



^ Meeting old friends and new....



^ By the end of the night, David was making strong declarations about how good the cheese was.... so, I got a picture of that.

Friday, Sept 11

Day 72...

Well, 8 years later there is not much sign of Sept 11 being a day set apart. A few things here and there, but less focus on it than years past. I guess last time we were here for it was the 5th anniversary, so much more going on. Today seemed just like another day.

Some things from the day...



^ We more or less have finished the den. Tara bought huge couches. They're ok, she likes them better than I do. I probably won't warm up to them fully until I nap on them. And Tara says they need pillows.



^ New kitchen chairs. The Shaker chairs are gone.



^ Here's the view from my desk. Window seat, nice....



^ So, I started to hear the punding of a band from my desk. Hmmmm.



^ I went down to see what was going on - it appears Charlotte is having its "Blue, Bews and Barbecue" Festival. You won't get that just anywhere. If you want insight into what it is all about, check out the sign on the right of this snap - "Outlaw Barbecue Shack - So Good It Oughtta Be ILLEGAL".



^ I will admit I enjoyed the band when they started playing the Allman Brothers. And it's amazing how every person in the crowd - old, young, black, white, white collar, blue collar - got energized by the Allman Brothers tune. I liked that.



^ Vegetable and fruit vendor.



^ Before going back to work, went to a park to see if anyone had placed 3,000 small flags in the ground - a rememberance of those who died in the WTC on Sept 11. This was a bit of a normal routine on 9/11 in years past.



^ Nothing.

Dahi

Day 71...

I made my own dahi, or yogurt. A little thing I learned in India.

Oh, hey Sam!

Day 70...



Today I got off the bus at 7:30 in uptown Charlotte, turned the corner and bumped into a friend from Hyderabad, Sam Uppaluri. He is not a Bank guy that I worked with, he's with another company altogether and had just gotten off the plane at midnight. This is perhaps the ultimate small world experience of all - we were just like "Hey!" on the streets of Charlotte.

Sam is the guy in the light blue shirt - above.

South Mecklenburg

We went to Liam's high school, named South Mecklenburg High School (above), today and attended parent's night. We met all of his teachers. They uniformly said he is doing well, is pretty quiet, and that he has been doing his homework.

Whew!

The school allows you to do two things on the web - see what assignments he has, as well as see what grades he is achieving.

So, that is good. We won't be out of the loop until some of the problems are deep - should they pop up again.

We were pretty proud to hear about his progress.

Laboring on Labor Day

Day 68...

Working our collective butts off today......

I asked Tara how long it has been since our things had arrived at the house - it has been only three weeks. We've done a huge amount in three weeks. Almost too much. We're so eager to have life here achieve some level of normalcy that we've been working very hard. And now that I am in my new role, I am a "nights-and-weekends" worker at home.

Some of the progress....



^ Front area painted....



^ Improved curb appeal. Admittedly, hard to notice from this picture - but it's amazing what a coat of paint will achieve.


Below is the big ticket item for the weekend.....



^ The den as it existed at the beginnig of the day. We have torn the wallpaper down, which left a huge amount of rough drywall, as well as ripped drywall caused by our ripping it off.



^ Have you heard of skim coating? We hadn't either. But we researched what you need to do to make a wall "like new" again. It involves joint compound, a certain type of wide knife, and a specifc technique of applying manually. It took a long time....



^ Tara applying some of the material. I did most of it... but she was a great asset in the whole process. She has the eye.



^ Yet more.



^ And, the largely finished product. Now it dries for a day, we sand and paint - again, at night.

Ashoka

Day 67....




We had visitors this evening, Gary and Rachna, but we forgot to take some snaps.

It was really great to see them!

Above is a picture of Ashoka in his new bed, very happy.