A Few Pictures

Here is a picture of the airport at Coimbatore, where I arrived at the end of July. The vegetation is quite lush and there are all kinds of plants.







The second shows the "Modern Day" grocery store just down the hill from the school and along the Garden Road, Ooty. I have had coffee and a brownie at the "Cafe Day" coffee shop. Coffee for 40 rupees and the brownie for 44 rupees. A rupee is worth about $0.026, so the coffee would have cost about $1.04 - not bad.





The third is walking back up the road to the Tibetan Market just outside the school gate. Yes, we share the road with anything that moo-ves!


Yesterday, Friday, we had a shortened school day. With the Under 14's winning their football (soccer) game we were in the finals at St. Joseph's School. We had 4 classes of 35 minutes in the morning and then lunch at 11:35 A.M. before boarding 18 school buses for the 15 km, 1 hour ride from Ooty to Coonoor. If you think there are potholes in Montreal, think again. There were places in the road where the bus drove on the right-side of the road as there was really no left-side to drive on due to the large pothole(s). We were quite a convoy of buses. Our bus driver did not like being at the back of the pack. At every opportunity he had he pulled out to pass the bus in front of us - corner or no corner, on-coming traffic or not! We kept waiting to hit a vehicle. Glad to say we made it without a scratch. There was a fair amount of horn blowing.

We arrived at St. Joseph's and took our seats in a reserved section of their covered stands. Their boys arrived and sat beside us. Could they cheer! We were nearly deafened by their shouting and cheering.

Our boys played well and went down to defeat of 4 - 0! The St. Joseph team has been together since June. Our guys have been together for about 3 weeks as were the other school in the competition. The scenery both going and coming was beautiful and I am now looking at renting a taxi with guide for the day at about 500 rupees to take me down to Coonoor and back. The wife of the principal has recommended Krishna and I will try and reserve him for later in the term when the monsoon is over. We should have dry weather in late September.

Today, Saturday, I went along with the Level 10 boys and we walked to Valley View for a look down the valley. The clouds were low and we had some rain - warm and gentle. We went through a eucalyptus forest and then out the other side to look down the valley. The mist in the trees was "other worldly". On our return trip several of us, including myself, slipped on the mud. I think some of the boys had a competition to see who could get the dirtiest. Saturday is shower day for the Level 10 boys dorm. (We are allowed three hot water showers a week. We are not allowed cold water showers as someone might use hot water!)

We do not have a water shortage. We do have a hot water shortage as there are solar tanks on the dorm roofs. Without the sun, hot water is in short supply during the rainy season.

Later I am out with the Level 12's for supper at a Chinese restaurant and then back to school for a video/DVD in the evening.