With Fingers Stained by Haldi: 8 August 2011

I’ll do my best to give a proper update of what’s happened in the last week. Sunday, 31 July was another day off. It was Jennie’s last day so I met up with her to visit a couple of temples with her host mother. Everyone else (I guess at that point it was just Liz and Swathi) went to a surgery camp in Coxtown. Venkateshji didn’t think they’d need me to I opted not to go. Jennie had been staying in Gandhi Bazaar with someone that had hosted her friend Sarah last summer. She was an interesting personality. Vijayalaksmhi was her name, I think. Anyway, she took us to a couple of temples where her family had donated the murthy. We were given the VIP treatment at each of them. She also took the opportunity to schmooze with all of the priests. I was told that she had an anniversary celebration to invite them all to. She gave me the number of a guy she knows who’s involved at a top Ayurveda college. I haven’t decided whether I’ll make contact. It might be interesting especially if I come back for an MBBS. My internet search today didn’t look so promising.

After the temples the driver dropped me at a petrol bunk in Padmanabha Nagar. I finally got to take a picture of those drug murals on the side of the road. Parimallaji was cleaning some greens when I returned home. We had an interesting sambar with roasted jackfruit seeds for lunch and then dinner. I read almost all of The Idiot’s Guide to Hinduism that afternoon and evening. Parimalla’s brother came over and showed me how to tie a dhoti. He said not to buy one because he has a bunch that were gifted to him. The dhoti was actually very comfortable—I realized in Kerala this weekend that it’s about the only comfortable thing you can wear there.

On Monday, 1 August, I took a bunch of buses around south Bangalore trying to find Jakkasandra. I had to pick up permission slips from Bosch. I then headed to Munichinappa and I got the go ahead for emergency followups.

Venkateshji had brought my things to Ajitashri—I hung out there for the rest of the day and started on my final report. Liz and I took an auto home together.

I actually moved that day. I’m staying in Bellandur out on the southeast side of Outer Ring Rd. It’s across from a B’lore Central Mall. I’m staying with a bachelor in his late twenties named Nitin. He’s north Indian and a Hindi speaker. He grew up living all over India since his father was in the air force. He’s actually the exact opposite of the RSS brothers. He’s a really interesting guy and I’m enjoying my stay here.

I don’t actually know what happened Tuesday. It’s likely that I’ve confused and blended the days.

Wednesday, I actually took the emergency referrals from Munichinappa to Dr. Aradhana’s clinic in Banashankari. The kids were crazy on the bus. One of the boys kept moving the seat back and forth trying to mess with the kid behind him. Three of the kids asked me for my trash so that they could throw it out the window. They thought it was insane that I held the tea cup from the school to the clinic. They also sang along really loud to this old Kannada song—I can never remember how it goes but I always recognize it when it comes on the radio.

It took us forever to figure out where the clinic was. The address said across from KK hospital but it was actually a block further south. Dr. Aradhana was really good about examining the kids. We made plans to start Doctors at School at Rajajeshwari this week.

Thursday, 4 August, we decided to have a meeting between the three interns even though everyone was gone on a retreat. We met at Ajitashri to exchange data and make plans for Bosch, etc… We had lunch at Subway. They are starting to recognize us but still are terrible at making sandwiches.