ANOTHER YEAR OLDER...

Hey, I made it through another year. John took off from work and we celebrated my birthday all day. We took the girls out with us for dinner. It was really nice. I've decided that I have got to leave my camera in my purse. Too many things have been happening and I never have my camera with me to take a picture and show you guys.

I have become an avid reader of the newspapers here, cutting out articles that have been very impacting on me (this place really has me trippin'), or just "what to do in Chennai", and taping them into scrapbooks. I saw where a jazz quartet from New York City was coming yesterday (Eli Yemen Jazz Quartet) Yeeaaahhhh, Americans.... so I drug Ashley and Bri into the car, and we got there. They were cool. Bri is studying keyboard at school and has a good "ear" for music. I gave a shout out to the "brother" on the sax before we left at the interlude. This guy could definitely "blow". Yeah, I miss home.

Got an email to come meet other Americacns, register to vote abroad, and watch Barack's acceptance speech. I am so glad we did. We met some really interesting people, including a couple of teachers who are at the school we were trying to get Bri into. Maybe there will be hope she can get in after Christmas there. This newspaper guy was there taking pictures of everbody. It was a fun night.

Ashley got her certificate yesterday for Occupational Therapy Assistant. I am so thankful she has finally completed this step. She is studying ayurveda (panchakarma) which is so interesting. I picked up one of her books and it was so interwoven with Indian words/yoga/and sanscript (picture writing), it gave me a headache. I was on line looking up every other word to try and comprehend it...this is truly a LABOR of love for her.

Okay I have booked a cruise and will tell you all later about our plans of travel during October. Boy is this one really exciting.

UPWARD AND ONWARD...

Well, my sisters are gone. I'm at a loss to describe my "zone" right now, but I am so grateful to have family come and see about us. We went to the OWC book club meeting and discussed "Sea of Poppies"...took a story trail tour through Parry's Corner in a bicycle rickshaw (yeah, we almost got creamed by a bus), and did another shopping trip with the same ladies. They were so much fun...I think I asked them everything I could possibly think of, from how do you really use a sprayer instead of toilet paper all the way to... why aren't you letting your daughters marry for love...No, they won't forget us anytime soon.

We didn't do much in Pondicherry, just got out of town and got lost trying to find the permit place to bring a car into their town. We saw our first funeral pr0cession there. The flowers,the body laid out on a wagon...the procession is reminiscent of what you might see in New Orleans.

We found a pretty good local food place, Dhaba Express, recommended by the women at OWC. Our waiter kept staring at us so much, I just asked him to come and sit down and eat with us. He graciously declined. So overall, my sisters got a really good view of India. We didn't make it to church here, our driver had an emergency issue which couldn't be helped; that's just the way it goes sometimes.

We are doing okay. No, Bri is not happy at her school, and I may end up homeschooling her...but I'll worry about that tomorrow. Our last moments were spent kicking through the water at the beach near our home. It began raining on us and we raced back to the car wet and sandy, and cruised through the streets of Chennai one more time. I can't get the pictures to load up for some reason. Guess I'll have to get Judy to email me the pictures. The two weeks went way too fast. I wonder who will come and visit us next? The last week of October we'll be gone...Fannie, are you coming for Christmas?

FUN, FUN, FUN

Synchronized swimming in the back yard........

Dorothy sporting her new frock (swarma) from a shopping spree

Ashley styling in a new top from Aunt Dorothy
St. Thomas basilica (from the Storyteller's tour)......

Chatting in front of the Wharf Restaurant

Temple shots outside of Temple Bay Resort....

Temple Bay Resort....

Our day couldn't have been better. We started with breakfast at LeMeridien and Dorothy and I had our eyebrows threaded. She was skeptical at first, but it went well, and we were both pleased with the outcome. Now we are at Temple Bay, eating dinner after having watched fireworks explode in the sky at a catered function near The Wharf. We sat in The Wharf restaurant watching white capped waves roll in, feeling the musky warm air as it caused the palms to dip and sway and bobbed our heads to faint echoes of Ray Charles coming across the sound system. Vendan drove so fast weaving through blockades getting us here, we finally had a chance to S L O W down.

This place is so nice, so calming. We strolled the beach, vendors hit us up, but we left all of our rupees back in the cottage...shucks. John swam in the infinity pool, Judy, Dorothy and I found our way to the fish pond to have our "happy feet" treatment. How can I begin to describe the feeling of seeing a swarm of fish surrounding you, and attacking your feet and legs. I was the first one in...Screams eeked from my throat...wow. It tickled, I panicked. Dorothy put her legs in...what a squeemish chick she was...so what do you think of the pictures!!! Judy can't wait to show her biology class these shots. Tomorrow morning Bree goes in.

Last night we went on a guided tour by "Story Trails". We visited a temple in Chennai. I can't remember the name of it, and heard stories of Hinduism. We went to the church where they have a piece of the original spear that was used to kill Thomas, the apostle. This is the way the storytellers told us the story...Thomas was there, had been there about 15 years or so and had favor with the king. Christianity was growing and this caused great anger among many Hindu there. He was killed with a lance thrown into his back. They buried his body and I think they said it was the Portugese who built a church over the top of it. Later the body was exhumed and moved I think to Spain. (all that remains in Chennai are a bone chip from the hand and a piece of the spear). The English later built a huge beautiful church building over the site. So there are like 3 places in the world where churches/basilicas have been built over apostle's bodies. Rome, Mylapore (Chennai), and I think the third one was in Spain.

We drove through the streets in rush hour traffic in a rickshaw. Yes many of these carts run on propane gas..nothing like getting high on propane fumes and smog filtering into your lungs...probably a lot like the air in Bejing right now with the Olympics looming ahead next week...(ha). The city tour culminated with eating at a vegan restaurant where we had a sampler platter of south Indian food. It's amazing the way they use spices, hot, sweet...cool yogurts... It was a good day.

As happy as I am with my sisters being here, I am already anticipating this sinking in my heart when they leave next week. I'm not ready to deal with that, to let go. Everything seems surreal. Time seems to be moving so fast. I spend so much time remembering "when" we did this or that 10, 15, 20, 30, 40 years ago. Time seems to stand still, but this old "clay body" seems to be aging...

It began raining as we finished our dinner at The Wharf, and we rode back to our seaside cottages in golf carts. (This driver could almost challenge Vendan the way he raced and swerved on the winding sidewalks). I can still hear Judy expressing wonder at the effect of those devastated by the Tsunami just a few short years ago as we had looked out into the bay earlier that day. Yes, many, many lives were lost in Chennai as well as other places. But the trance of that thought was abruptly ended when I heard Judy exclaim about bugs in her room. (No way!!!) Yeah, way...so they have called for an exterminator. John crashed hours ago, and of course Bree ran off to be in their room and see the bugs since that is where all the excitement is. (John and I are just boring deadbeats I guess who go to bed way too early). Well, Bree came back and reported that four men arrived to spray the bugs and to change a light bulb...I'm gonna leave that one alone. Ha. But get this...I wasn't going to even go into it, but I guess I will. John's company threw a "FAMILY DAY" party for the their employees last Saturday. I hated that my sisters missed it by two days, it just couldn't be helped. Anyway, all I could say was WOW... unbelievable, like totally professional with the dancing, pyroglyphics (?), and the fashion show they put on portraying the garb of each state of India was breathtaking. Be that as it may, as John swam around in the pool earlier today, he told me that he had met a Bollywood producer/choreographer, and as they chatted, he mentioned the fact that he had choreographed the dances for the Family Day affair thrown by the company...Oh yeah, one of his good friends worked for this same company...Oh yeah, come to find out that John has been training his very same "good friend" at work. How wierd is that. We really do live in a "small world".

We hit the mall earlier this week, and only made it to two stores before we had to race out and get Bree from school. Be sure to ask Dorothy about her jewelry. You know she's definitely into jewelry...rubies, tiger eyes. Judy didn't do too badly either. But the point I was making is...as slow as mom was when it comes to shopping...Dorothy is a chip off the old block. We had so much fun. The store owners had tea brought in, chairs brought in for us and anything we could think of that we wanted, if he didn't have it, his side-kick ran out the door to another spot in the mall where it was, and brought it back. This was crazy, but we had a great time, and that is all that mattered. We have two more shopping excursions set for next week, and tomorrow we head on to Pondicherry after viewing a few of the temples here. Time for this day to come to a close...I've gotta crash too.

MY SISTERS ARE HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

THANK YOU JESUS for letting my sisters make it to Chennai. Yes, Dorothy and Judy braved storms and flight delays and layovers and plane switch-0vers to come and see me in Chennai. I am SOOOOO happy. I got them h0me, they slept ALL DAY...They were supposed to come through Paris on Delta, but ended up on British Airways through Heathrow a day later ...but they made it. We are just chillin'... we went to the Asiana for dinner at the Wild Fire. We were going to Farmhouse, it was closed for an hour, headed to Lydie's, she was closed....headed to LeMeridian...and Rajah (John's driver) said it would take 2 hours in rush hour traffic...so we just went around the corner to Asiana. They have great Thai food...well that restaurant was closed on Mondays. Seems like a bad omen to me, nothing was giving way...so we just went to Wild Fire, the other restaurant there. It was a beautiful dinner, and we had fun sampling each others food. Dorothy took pictures of the appetizers and desserts. I feel like a stuffed potato. After a good stiff drink of south Indian Coffee (boy will that put hair on your chest), I think I've got my second wind.

Judy says: "I'm still sleepy with jet lag, ask me about India tomorrow. I'm a stuffed potato tonight"...
Dorothy says...: Dorothy is out. I tried to wake her, but she has crashed. So much for staying up all night and watching movies and talking.

We broke into a rendition of several gospel hymns on the way home from dinner. (Totally freaked Rajah out as he was trying to maneuver through traffic, but hey...you know the Spence girls can sing at the drop of a hat...Papa would be proud of that. It was a good day, just wait until you see what I've got planned for them this week...hang on. Oh, so you want to know a little bit more before you check back? Okay, we are going to Temple Bay for the night and we are going to have the happy feet treatment where you put your feet in water and fish come up and eat the dead skin and crud off of your bunions and calluses. Well, you know John with his athlete's feet has already refused to take the treatment. I'm sure he'd be drawing back a nub after the fish got through nibbling on him. Judy said it would be payback for all the fishing he has done...give the fish a chance to get even with him. HA.

HEAD SLAM

Last night I got a call from John and went out on the deck and jumped in my wicker swing that hangs by a thick metal chain from the ceiling.. I got one big push off, and KABOOM...the screw in the cement holding the thick metal chain gave way, and I crashed to the floor with the heavy metal chain whacking me in the head...I was on the phone with John and screamed...and he had hung up seconds before it happened. I sat there dazed, waiting to see if blood would gush forward. Thank God that didn't happen, but I couldn't get off the floor. The girls didn't hear me scream, they were sitting in my bed watching BABE...(I love that movie)...Bottom line, my head feels so sore. I'm getting another ice pack, took a mega dose of Advil, and I am going back to bed.

NO 4TH JULY BANG HERE...

Look closely at this picture, look very closely. Do you see any fireworks going off...Nope. Actually, this is a panoramic view of the city of Chennai from the top of St. Thomas Mount which I wrote about awhile back. In fact I took the picture about a month ago. I was reading the local paper today, "The Hindu", and wow -- the title of the article is: "Life of St. Thomas to be captured on silver Screen".....Yes, they are gonna make a movie about Thomas here...."Thomas is believed to have brought Christianity to India, founding 7 churches in Kerala before before being martyred in Mylapore in 72 AD." I wonder will it be in Tamil or will they have the English version as well.

Anyway, back to the 4th...well John had to go to work and Briana had to go to school. No, Ash and I did not get any barbeque ribs, but watermelon abounds here. I really miss seeing the fireworks. From the news it looks like there's "fire-a-plenty" in California right now...Yep, I miss home.

Bree was furious...no 4th of July day off? She just couldn't understand why they wouldn't celebrate that date here (go figure)...and in her rebellious mode she refused to wear her uniform to school, opting rather to wear some bizarre outfit in protest. Being the ever attentive mother that I am, I just said..."Fine with me, kiddo". I just told her to be sure to give me a call if there was a problem, and have a nice day. ha.

Well, I forgot to mention that we did get our VONAGE GOING. Thank you to Rich and Stephanie for making it happen. Thank you Ted for telling me to get a fast ethernet switch, which is why it didn't happen sooner...I just need an EASY BUTTON for life here. Now, if only customs would release my two digital converter boxes so I could watch tv, I would almost feel like being "home" when I walk into this house. They are holding my ozonator that I ordered from ebay as well. I'll let you know when I get that again and will update my "What's Marsha Up to Now" blog when I continue body ozonating. See Judy/Fannie to call me, ya'll.

IT WENT LIKE THIS...

I don't know where to start, so I'll start on the end and work my way backwards...If you read Bree's blog, then you may already know this, yes she spilled the beans on the Shark's Bay Hilton Hotel. Nobody told us that this was going to be a place for all happy topless sunbathers when I booked this package. Thank you, Cox and Kings...I walked in our room, it was so nice, looked out of the window, and my mouth dropped open. What!!!! Yes, topless sunbathers. I grabbed the phone and called Ashley and Bri's room (It was so nice to have them out of my room for the whole trip...) anyway, I called Ashley and told her, tell Bree that women are topless here and don't go into shock, it's just a boob, and we (women) all have breasts (some of us one, some of us two). I guess the style is to have the pierced stomach jewelry going on, and tatoos everywhere. I didn't spot any nipple rings. Geez.... I don't want you to get the idea this was a nudist colony. No, that wasn't the case, but many women chose to go topless, and if my $$ was right I would have gone elsewhere, but by the end of the trip, we were cutting it close $$ if you know what I mean.

This is a place frequented mostly by Europeans, Swedish, French; not many Americans come here. I tried to explain to Bree about the different cultures, whether it's men peeing in the streets of India or bare-breasted women roasting in the sun in Sharm el Sheik, she has been exposed to quite a few different cultures. There were little girls, oh 8, 9, 10 years old, topless with their mothers. Little tykes scamping about bottomless, muslim women swimming in the pool in black long sleeve shirts and leggings...it was just one strange, huge cultural melting pot sitting there as I stared out of my window at the watering hole. Needless to say, there were waiters oggling the topless girls, tripping with drinks in hand, not watching where they were going.

Well, John and I went to the shore of the Red Sea to scope out the area for snorkeling, and low and behold, there was a topless, buxom Grandma coming towards us wanting to talk about the beautiful fish in the coral reef, camera in hand. Ya know, I just pointed out to her the most beautiful blue and yellow fish I had ever seen right near my feet in the water, and she chatted on about all of the beautiful fish she had pictures of.

Snorkeling was AWESOME, such beautiful sea life. Later I saw the signs warning or sharks there and the rip tide, swim at your own risk. No, I would not have gotten in the water if I had seen that first. Duh, I didn't even associate the hotel's name (Shark's Bay) with danger snorkeling there.

Enough said about that...let me tell you what it was like to climb Mt. Sinai. We left our hotel at about 11:00 p.m. heading three hours north to the mountain. There were many check points along the way, we had to show our passports constantly, all guards are armed. I decided to just "be cool" and roll with the flow. The guide let us know not many Americans come here...hmmm. I asked him had he ever been to America; he let me know rather snippily how difficult it was for anyone from Egypt to get a Visa to get in. OKAY...I had taken some herbs that unfortuneately had the effect of constantly having to go to the restroom, and I forgot to tell you, YOU HAVE TO PAY TO PEE HERE. They have you over a barrel. (I made constant stops, and these latrines were so filthy, I should have just gone behind a rock somewhere, really). We got to the bottom of the mountain, got our guide and I knew to get a camel, I didn't have the energy to walk that far up. Our guide, Mahammed was kind. We each had an escort to pull our camels or whack them in the rear which caused them to jolt forward in the pitch black night, or stumble close to the edge of the cliff on the trail. I asked Mahammed how many people had fallen over the cliff on this hike. He said he would tell us when we got down in the morning....(his silence spoke volumes to me).

FOR ME THIS TREK WAS THE MOST MEMORABLE EVENT. It got really cold climbing the mountain. It was pitch black, save for the bright stars twinkling above, and as we rounded the curve of the trail, the FULL MOON glowed so brightly, it was almost like receiving a kiss from God. It was so serne, so peaceful. Thoughts of Moses raced through my mind, thoughts of God actually coming to this mount to communicate with him...AWESOME. Well the camels could only go so far, and then we had to hit it on foot. SUNRISE THERE WAS BEAUTIFUL. Yes, I tripped and fell twice, twisted my ankle, but not badly. One lady had an asthma attack, and Ashley ran to help her with Frankencense essential oils we had purchased in Cairo to clear her sinuses. She spoke broken English and Spanish, and it seemed like people were just standing around her watching her gasp and cry. She kept crying "Don't let me die on this mountain"...I was too weak to go to the top, and Ashley had stayed with me. John and Briana went to the very top. People were singing up there to God and reading their Bibles. One girl fell near John, and broke her foot. John told me later she didn't have $$ to get a camel down, and he paid the guide to find a camel and take her down. Johnnie is a good boy...(Don't get me wrong, I kept a close eye on him when we were in the pool area at the hotel, ha. Reminds me of our 10th anniversary in Cancun with Dorothy and Perry, but that is another story). The walk down was hard, and we had to get a camel for Bree, she was getting dizzy. Needless to say we cancelled the bedouin lunch. I was over ambitious in planning, and YES, I am still sore today from this trek.

THERE IS SO MUCH TO TELL. I loved the NILE cruise. We met such friendly people. The food was good. Our group was small, and some were from Chennai. We had a good friend from Austrailia on the Cruise. (HI ROBIN). She was just so very knowledgeable, she reminds me of my sister, Joanne. We had such fun laughing at the belly dancer stories. John was too tired to come watch that evening, but boy did we have a good time.

Going into the tombs and temples were simply amazing. I love ancient history, and didn't get to do any research prior to the trip because I was just too busy. I ran and got volume 1 from Will Durant's History of Civilization, my Bible, the complete works of Josephus, books on Egypt which I had bought there. I read of the Rosetta stone, what triggered the French explorers to go and map out Luxor and Karnack, what they found in the early 1800's. So I am thinking, 50 years later or so, we were having our civil war, and they are just digging these temples out then, as old as they are, like no one remembered they were there? How did all of this get swallowed up by the desert? I want to read more about Carter (CURSE OF THE MUMMY) who unearthed Tut's tomb. OH THE TREASURES THAT WE SAW IN THE MUSEUM OF ANTIQUITY...I wanted to know who was in power when Moses was placed into the Nile? Which king ruled when JOSEPH came to Egypt. I saw scratchings of Greek in some of the temples where the early Christians were hiding, I tried to freel their angst, anxiety, courage. This was my trip of a lifetime.

I am so thankful I felt good enough to take this trip with my family. It basically went without a hitch. I am sick of charter planes. We flew so much...Chennai to Bombay(Mumbai), to Cairo, to Aswan, to Abu Simbel, back to Aswan, to Luxor, to Cairo, to Sharm el Sheik, back to Cario, to Mumbai and back home to CHENNAI. Next time, a simple cruise will be just fine I think...

Ashley let me know that I'm writing too much about Bree in the blog and not enough about her, so let me shift gears and talk about A*S*H*L*E*Y.....Ashley had a great time. From an African American point of view, we were loved. I'm telling you, it was amazing. Cries from men "COUSIN"...Ha. Yes, Egyptian people are very attractive and Ashley was elated (and Bree) to have so much positive attention showered on them. You have so many cultures that have ruled in Egypt...Nubians, Greeks, French, Romans...Arab/Muslim influence which took over after Christianity had a foothold there...(I've gotta read through my history books to get it all right). But don't get me wrong, this is a tourist economy in Egypt, and it didn't take John long to come up with the diddy, Egypt, "means He gyped you"....We got taken several times, but it wasn't that big of a deal. There is much love and kindness shown to us in Egypt. Go, if you can...go.