Start of Family Visiting - Dindigul (திண்டுக்கல்) May 30

        Since I am now officially done with the Indian portion of my project I now have to try to see as much of my family as possible. My one uncle in Dindigul came to pick me and my grandma up from house mid-morning with his two kids to take us back to his home. I get really confused at how I am supposed to address all my relatives so trying to explain it to others makes it even more confusing but I think you'll be able to follow along for the most part. He brought his two kids with him, Rithani (the older one) and Kavin Raj (the younger one that is also a huge trouble maker). He had already told me while I was in Pittsburgh that I better bring him a remote controlled helicopter for him otherwise he'd hit me and kick me when he saw me and I was a little apprehensive because he can pack quite a punch for being so little. Plus I didn't exactly get him a remote controlled helicopter since they were so big and expensive and he tends to break things as soon as he gets them but he seemed happy with the regular helicopter I got him which was a relief.

      We left about a half hour after they arrived, making a brief stop for ice cream.

 

They were both very happy with the Strawberry Jelly Kick Ice Pops

       The car ride was anything but peaceful because I had both kids climbing all over me, especially Kavin, for the two and a half hours of the trip. He just wouldn't sit still and kept climbing over me, on me, kicking my grandmother in the head while moving around, kicking his sister in the head which would then start a fight and omg I was so happy to be out of that car at the end of the trip. Once we got to my uncle's house we had lunch and then just chilled until around 7 when we went shopping for school supplies for the little ones. Rithani starts school on the 3rd and Kavin starts on the 6th and they both wanted bags and other stuff. However, before we got into the store we had to stop and get sweet corn from a vendor and spent a good half hour in front of the store eating corn.

 

They both ended up eating 3 cups of sweet corn which was kind of ridiculous

     But finally we got into the store and managed to get everything that they wanted. I also ended up buying Kavin a wallet (don't know what a 7 yr old needs a leather wallet for) but he wanted one because I gave his sister a purse as a gift. By the time we got back we were all exhausted but I had promised to put some mehndi on Rithani's hands so we were up until 11:30 putting mehndi on and waiting for it to dry so we could go to bed. Needless to say it was a long and exhausting day. I feel so old because my body hurts from all the places that Kavin stepped on. 

Trains, Planes and Cars: Going back to Sulur - May 29

              Unfortunately I had to wake up at 5 something in the morning to get ready to leave Valsad and I would reach home around 8:00pm so I had a looooong day of travel ahead of me. I also think I get stressed out before having to travel because I had a really hard time falling asleep which wasn't great because I couldn't sleep until I got to my grandmas. I did manage to pack all the things I bought and have them fit the weight limit which I think is a miracle because the clothes I bought were very heavy. Dr. Italia sent a car to pick me up from the hotel and take me to the railway station where Riddhima and Ushma met me to take me to the right platform and train car. I was a little bit nervous because I had only been on a train in India once before (that I remember) and I had been with my mom and sister and uncle. We also had only two minutes to get in the right car (which we didn't at first) but after some quick moving around we managed to find my seat and get all my stuff settled before the train started.

  

My hands did get even darker which was awesome. It was a really dark maroon color

 

Waiting at the Valsad station. Inside the train car

Lookimg down the length of the car

               Once I was in my seat a lot of tension went away because a driver would be waiting for me in Bombay to take me to the airport and after that I was home free. The train ride was somewhat uneventful, it took 3 hours so I just listened to music and read a book. They gave us breakfast but I really wasn't in the mood to eat so I just had some bread and juice and gave the rest back. Once we reached Bombay, it took about an hour to get to the airport and somehow the airline let me check in six hours before my flight so I could check my luggage and relax before the flight. Watched some Will and Grace, had lunch, read an Indian Cosmo (which is very different from Cosmos in the US) and read another book all the while wishing I could sleep but I had to hold off for a few more hours. 

Mickey D's billboard in Bombay

            The flight itself was only around two hours and there was a really cute 18 month old girl (Diya) that was next to me so I spent most of the flight playing with her which made the time pass very quickly. My aunt and cousin picked me up from the airport and we didn't get home until 8 - 8:30. Another aunt and uncle had come to visit the day before so they were waiting for me with my grandma when I got back. I had some dinner, showed everyone the stuff I bought which then I had to put away before going to sleep.

         Very happy to be done traveling, I'm not looking forward to next week when we'll have close to a 40 hour journey back to Pittsburgh. Going to be a fun ride....

Last Day in Valsad = Mehndi May 28

               My last day at the blood bank was very chill. Tanvi had brought her wedding album so we spent the first part of the morning looking at all the pictures. She looked gorgeous and I loved her wedding sari. It was interesting to see how people dress differently in the north and the south even for weddings. Ushma wanted to make a video of our Daman trip so that was something else we worked on. You can watch the video two posts down.
               After lunch the girls had arranged for one of the ladies at the blood bank to put mehndi on my hands which ended up taking around 2 hours. While the lady was in the middle of working on the design Dr. Italia called all of us for a meeting so we had to stop for a bit while we all met with him. He basically just wanted to make sure that I had all of the information I needed for my project and that I had enjoyed my trip. They all gave me a gift which I already packed so I'll take a picture and put it up when I write my next post. He wished me luck and told me to come back and visit which I would like to do so hopefully I can get some funding to come visit again. I would like to come back in 6 months to a year to see how the program has improved and to see what the next step would be.
              I went back to finish up my mehndi after our meeting and we just spent the rest of the day chatting while I waited to take the mehndi off. The lady did an amazing job with the design.

 

I loved the design. Parts of it remind me of Ganesha

The finished product

 

When I first took everything off. It's gotten much darker and will probably be even darker in the morning

Shopping Part 5, Dinner at Ushma's and the Tadakeshwar Temple - May 27

         Everyone was exhausted from getting back so late the night before. Dr. Italia was going to Gandhinagar to present the NBS program so our morning consisted of putting together reports and data that we could send to Dr. Italia to use for his meeting. Apparently I am a fast typer so I was designated computer person and was responsible for putting together everything that was in the report so it looked presentable. Dr. Italia would call with different requests throughout the morning so everyone was running around all morning gathering all the documents and data necessary. It was helpful for me also because I got to see all the reports from the project and the number of individuals with trait and disease and the breakdown between different groups. 

        The afternoon somewhat dragged because we were all tired and since Dr. Italia wasn't here there wasn't anything more to work on for my project. I have all the information that I need from here and my work will start when I get back to Pittsburgh. But finally when 6pm rolled around, Riddhima, Dhara and I headed to a nearby store to buy some more stuff that I wanted. The things that I purchased today are made in Gujarat and exported everywhere else so it is cheaper to buy them here. 

3 more cotton chaniya cholis for myself and my sister

Dress material to get salwars stitched 

     After shopping we headed to Ushma's house for dinner. We had a dish that looked and tasted a lot like idlis, puris, koorma, mango raas, jeera rice, dhaal fry, and sweets. It was all delicious and it was nice to have another homemade meal. After dinner Ushma took me to the Tadakeshwar (sp?) Temple (Shiva Temple) that her husband goes to everyday. It was a gorgeous temple and the roof is completely open. It was really nice to go at night because it was almost empty and it was nice and peaceful. After praying we sat outside for almost an hour just enjoying the weather and calmness.  

Shivan Temple

Unfortunately we had to leave because I wanted to come back and pack my stuff so that I wouldn't have to do it tomorrow. Can't believe the two weeks here are almost over...

Daman, Another Camel Ride and a Seaside Restaurant – May 26

                 For the first few hours of the morning we changed and edited all the SOPs to take into consideration all of Dr. Italia’s suggestions. However, everyone was giddy with excitement to go to Daman so after finishing the SOPs we just sat around chatting and talking. Dr. Italia told us to be ready by 4 so we could leave by 4:30 but he didn’t show up until 5:15. I don’t think he ever arrives on time for any of his engagements. Apparently this was the first time that he voluntarily took his staff members out for fun during the work day. Technically work ends at 6pm but we were done working long before. We hit some traffic on our way to Daman so it took a little longer to get there but we also had to drop Dr. Italia off at his pathology lab in Vapi before heading to Daman.

            As soon as we entered Daman all you saw were billboards for different types of alcohol and bars and restaurants. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that many liquor shops and bars in one town let alone one stretch. It was crazy but since the entire state of Gujarat is dry people come to Daman to get their liquor fix. Our first stop was Jampore Beach in Daman. It was pretty crowded but more peaceful than Tithal. They had camels here as well so we decided to go on another ride since this time everyone was able to make it. I definitely think that this camel was taller than the one in Tithal because it was hard to get on and we just felt higher than the last time. Dr. Abhishek and Jithin Bhai got quite a few entertaining pictures of us on the camels.

 

Getting on the camels. It was terrifying when the camel stood up

 

The beach 

 

I don't know what's scarier, having the camel stand or sit

 

We got to pose with the camel :-) Me, Dhara, Riddhima, Ushma and Tanvi

 

All in all a great day at the beach. 

             After the camel ride we had some bhel puri and decided to head to one of the shopping markets. There was basically stall after stall in a row selling all sorts of random items. It was really hot and muggy so we didn’t spend a ton of time there. We made one round and stopped if we saw anything interesting. 

It was a long line of stalls

           By this time it was already 8 and we had to go back to Vapi to pick up Dr. Italia and come back to Daman for dinner. So after buying a few things we headed to Vapi. Dr. Italia had picked Hotel Majmar as our dinner destination. It was a really nice seaside restaurant. It was pretty big restaurant with a huge tent covering us above. Our table was at the very end and overlooked the beach which was gorgeous at night. Everyone ordered their choice of drinks both alcoholic and non-alcoholic. Basically all the girls had mocktails and the guys had beer. Not very inventive but whatever. We had a great dinner though. There were a ton of different dishes. Tanvi, Dhara and Ushma are vegetarians so they had their own dishes while the rest of us ordered various chicken and seafood dishes. Chicken tikka, prawns in garlic, and a few other chicken dishes that I don’t know the name of but they were delicious. We had a great time but we didn’t finish until around 11pm so everyone was pretty exhausted on the drive home. I didn’t get back to my room until midnight but we had a great time yesterday and it was the first time that all four girls were able to come together. 

 

At dinner and then after dinner getting ready to leave

*A video we made at work today of our trip

Standard Operating Procedures and my Chaniya Choli :-P - May 25

          Today probably was the longest day so far. We didn't physically spend any more time than usual at the Blood Bank but we spent the entire day creating Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for the NBS program. The SOPs outline all the steps involved in the various procedures, contingency plans, instructions for machine operations and .... We ended up creating around 9 SOPs today and have 1 more left to do tomorrow. Dr. Italia called us all down for a meeting around 5:30 and went over everything with us and thankfully we didn't have too many corrections. Just a few word changes. Never again do I want to spend that much time writing out instructions for lab procedures. And today was also one of those days where everyone was exhausted behind belief even though we all got more than enough sleep. We basically took turns yawning and stretching for the duration of the day but we got a lot of work done today towards my project.
           During our meeting Dr. Italia said that he would take us to the union territory of Daman tomorrow so that we can explore, do some shopping and have fun. Alcohol is not allowed in the state of Gujarat but it is available in the union territories so it has a lot of shops and restaurants and is apparently a popular place to go especially during the vacation month of May.
           After work Ushma and I went to Mangaldeep, to pick up my chaniya choli and  I love it even more :-)

The dupatta and skirt: there are small red and green mirrors all over the skirt

Village Visits, Mango Gardens and Homemade Dinners - May 24

               After our meeting yesterday Dr. Italia seemed to think it would be nice and informational for me to visit another Primary Health Center and go along with some of the counselors to visit families that are affected by Sickle Cell. So today, Tanvi, Dr. Abhishek and I went to the Primary Health Center in Gage. It was kind of entertaining when we first got there because everyone that worked at the health center was waiting for me. Dr. Italia had called them ahead of time to tell them that I would be coming to observe so they all were there to show me what they did. Chairs were pulled out for me, someone went out and bought a bottle of slice when they realized that there wasn’t any filter water and I was treated very well. It was amusing. Anyway, while I was there I got to observe the lab technicians while they performed the initial DDT test on the samples collected. This initial test is done on the samples collected during screening of the villages (not the newborns). A positive test result will appear if the individual is trait or disease so if a positive test result is found then the sample will be sent to the lab in Valsad for confirmatory testing to determine the exact sickle status of the individual. On average the lab in Gage screens around 500-600 individuals every month.  The primary center we visited today serves 6 villages in the area and provides counseling and medicine to 52 sickle cell disease patients. They also have awareness days at local schools and conduct mass screening camps in the schools and other areas in the various villages.

     The two counselors at the health center took us to meet two families in the nearby villages. The first person we met was a lady that was diagnosed with sickle cell in 2009. She is probably in her mid-40s and already has children. Before her diagnosis she had been in hospitals due to painful crises and for blood transfusions. But after her diagnosis and receiving medicine she has not been admitted to the hospital and her pain crises have been managed by pain medication. She has two kids and both of her kids are trait positive and do not have disease. The next family that we visited was very interesting to learn about. The father, son, daughter and father’s sister all have sickle cell disease while the mother has sickle cell trait. All five members have at least one copy of the sickle gene. The daughter has had the need for one blood transfusion but other than that no one has had any pain crisis or complications with SCD before or after diagnosis. Remember that all of these individuals were diagnosed in recent years through the Sickle Control program.

The first place family we visited. 

     After visiting these villages we went to the Chickili Blood Bank to eat our lunch. Apparently there is a shop across the street from the blood bank that has really good egg dishes and our driver and Dr. Abhishek really wanted to get food from there. They ordered and sent two dishes to Tanvi and me which were very good. Don’t know exactly what they were but there were some sort of egg/vegetable mixed dish?

Tanvi and My Lunch: It looks weird but it was actually really good

  After lunch we went to Tanvi’s home, or rather her parent’s home since she lives in Valsad with her husband’s family. Tanvi’s father has a mango farm so we all went to see the farm and it was amazing! Apparently southern Gujarat has a lot of mango farms and Tanvi said her father has 400-500 mango trees. There were so many different types of mangos and I was in heaven. Most of the mangos will not ripen until mid-June but she gave me a mango that I can eat green with some salt and chili powder. Will have to find a knife first but it was so cool to see a mango farm.

 

Entrance to the mango farm               So many mangos!!!!!!

 

Packing of the mangos

 

              Tanvi, Dr. Abhishek and Jithin Bhai                    Mango!                                                      

Tanvi's niece Harshuvi

       We headed back to Valsad after the visit to the farm. Along the way....

 

People washing their clothes and drying them by the river. Some kids going along for the ride on the tractor

 

For some reason people love painting their houses with bright colors. This house had practically every color of the rainbow somewhere. Loved the flower on the right. There were different types of flowers on all the farms we drove by today

A lorry accident we passed by on the way back to the blood bank

         While we were gone for the day the other girls had gone through the PEAS document and put together some of the standard operating procedure guidelines that needed to be created which was very helpful. Riddhima had invited me to her house for dinner so after work, Riddhima, Dhara (who is also Riddhima’s cousin), and I headed to her house. We got there a little early so we went to the Sai Baba temple that was down at the other end of Tithal Beach. The temples here are gorgeous and that much better because they are along the beach.

  

Sai Baba Temple

   

The view of the beach from the temple

       When we reached Riddhima’s house again she gave me a tour of her house before dinner. It’s a gorgeous house and her mother made one of the best dinners I have ever had and I am very very picky when it comes to eating Indian food. There was so much food and it was all so delicious. We had puri with subjee, mango pudding, vada, pappadam, spicy buttermilk, rice and daal. Her mother kept putting more food and my plate and by the time we got done with dinner all three of us were stuffed. I especially liked the mango pudding, it was cool and refreshing. Riddhima and Dhara’s grandmother was there as well and she was so cute. She only spoke Gujarati so she just smiled at me a lot and asked me questions through Dhara and Riddhima. As I left Riddhima’s mother gave me a gift and it’s a gorgeous jewelry box. It was totally unexpected but it’s so pretty and a perfect gift for me.

      All in all it was a great day and this meal is probably the best I’ve had so far on my trip. Her mother basically invited me over for the rest of the week if I wanted to have dinner with them. I’m tempted to take her up on her offer because she is an amazing cook.  I’m excited for tomorrow now, I get to pick up my chaniya choli and do more shopping :-P

The jewelry box Riddhima's mother gave me