Just me and my boys!

My friend Sue did a photo shoot of my family the Saturday before Alex left for the MTC! The photo's turned out so good! Take a sneak peak for yourself at http://www.suerichardsonphotography.blogspot.com/
Thanks Sue-bee - you are a master.. and yes - I needed a tissue!

"Don't feed the animals"

I know my India posts are sort of random at this point. I've been home for a week now, but I had to share another story. The last night we were in India, we went sightseeing to "the Shore Temple". This is not an LDS temple, but rather, many ancient temples that are carved out of a mountain. They were carved in the 7th Century under the reign of Rajasimha. It is really beautiful and quite remarkable to see the amount of detail in these carvings. Each is an individual masterpiece.

The temples are located right near the Indian Ocean, so we made a stop at the beach before heading back to our hotel. As we were driving to the beach, we spotted a monkey sitting on a wall. It was our first "wild animal" (alive) so we decided to get out and see it. Jim had a small package of crackers, so he opened it and walked to the wall to give a cracker to the monkey, which the monkey was glad to accept. At the same time - he felt the tug of a hand on his shirt, and this girl was pointing to her mouth.. essentially saying "don't feed the monkey - feed me".

This was one of the many times in India that I felt a giant sob inside. Look at her - she is so beautiful. We obviously gave her the remaining crackers, and she, in turn, gave us a smile. Oh how I wish I could have brought her home with me to live. She will be carved in my memory forever.

Not to be rude, but..

Can you tell what this woman does for a living? I'll give you a hint.. it's not Human Resources!

"Your Little Boy"

I am lucky enough to get an e-mail from Alex each Tuesday, but I'm telling you - this kid really knows how to "work it" with his mom. Here are two examples:

1- every e-mail has the same sign off that says "Love, your little boy"
2- In my letter this week, Alex had drawn an outline of his hand

I'm sure he knew that the minute I opened it, I would put my hand on it... which is exactly what I did. He's really got me figured out! If you are a mom, reading this entry, and NOT crying... you have a heart of stone!

Here are the photo's included in my letter last night. It's so good to see his face, and he looks so happy! One other piece of good news - he was called to be a District Leader on Sunday. Go get 'em Elder!

Great Aunt Me

Hello World! Meet my nephew. Porter J. Munson arrived on Wednesday, March 19th. He was born to my nephew Patrick and his wife Skye. He weighed in at a whopping 7 lbs and is a 19 pounder. We are so happy to have a new baby in our family! Lucky us and congratulations Grandpa Kurt and Grandma Lori!

Click here to see more... http://www.patrickandskye.blogspot.com/

No "Naan" sense

Indian's make this bread called Naan (pronounced Non), that I fell in love with. It's sort of a flat bread, almost tortilla or pita style. I wasn't so much diggin' the other Indian food, so I have had Naan just about every day.

Here is a guy that is making Naan in his "restaurant"...

Here is why I didn't buy any Naan, from this vendor.... reason? You have to walk the plank over the river of garbage to get to his Naan... Suddenly... I'm not feelin' so hungry!!

I'm thinking of starting a carpool... any takers?

Now this is living...

My adventures at the "Snake Park"

We went to the Chennai Snake Park while in India, but I will admit - it wasn't exactly what I was hoping for. This is more like what I thought it would be... yeah.... not so much...

One intereting thing, that you don't really deal with in the US is - you have to pay money to take a camera in. Jim and I both had camera's in our hands when we went in, so they told us we had to pay extra to take a camera in.

Here is a sign of important information about the snake park. Hopefully, I didn't break any rules, but I'm really not sure. My tamil is not fluent... (ok you busted me, - I don't know any tamil)

We saw a lot of what appeard to be "reptiles" in zoo-like conditions, however, I'll be honest with you - I don't think they were alive. I watched the alligators very, very closely, and none of them moved for like 10 minutes... Even I can't hold my breath that long.. This guy with his mouth open, didn't close it ONCE, when I was watching... Sorry, Snake Park owners... I'm not buying it!It was an intereting snake park experience - we did see some snakes, but my favorite part of the Snake Park was the bathrooms.. why... you ask?


I didn't go, because I didn't have a big bun and bindi, nor did I have a cool 70's moustache, so I really wasn't sure which one was right for me!

Boys will be Boys!

The children here love to see me aim my camera at them! Unfortunately, most of the time, I'm in a car, going about 40, so it makes it difficult to get really good shots. But here are a few of the friendly faces of the boys in India. Tonight - Jim and I decided to go for a walk. We walked just outside the fence of our hotel and there were two boys walking our direction- holding their pet duck. These boys live just about 30 yards behind our 5 star hotel in a shack with a thatch roof.In fact- when I walk into the hall - I can look out the window of the hotel into their tiny little village. They were so excited to have their picture taken with their duck and they loved being able to see it on the screen of the digital camera.

The children here are beautiful!

Beautiful Girls!

The women and young girls here are fascinating to me!  I've never seen so many beautiful girls!

"You have the courage of a man and the intellect of a woman!"

Huh?  Is that a compliment?  This "fortune" was told to me by a card reading parrot at the beach on the Indian Ocean.

We went to the Bay of Bengal tonight and it was a very interesting experience.  As we walked around, we decided to "partake" of the good times..  First we shot BB guns at balloons!  I was a sharpshooter, then we got our fortune told by a parrot. First rule - you have to tell the parrot your name and age...   The parrot comes out of his cage and starts drawing cards with it's beak - once the parrot finds the card he wants (in other words gets bored with this trick) he hands it to the card reader (the guy in orange), who opens the card and then tells your fortune.

One of the first things that the parrot fortune teller told me was "you are stressed about your son or daughter"... hmmm-- maybe we are on to something..  next - "if you open a business in your own name, it will be very successful"  well - we've been trying to get approval on "Galileo - India...  maybe we should change it to "Kris Tanner - India"... finally, he said "you have the courage of a man and the intellect of a woman."  What the heck does that mean?  I think it may somehow be a insult, but I'm not sure! 

Here are some of the other sites from our Bay of Bengal adventure...  Trust me - these are not the same beaches that we long for on vacation.

Fresh Corn   Games and Beach toys!

Pharaoh's dream!

Remember in the story Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, when Pharaoh has a dream about the "7 skinny cows all skinny and vile"?  I found those cows!  They live in India.

Some residents say they belong to someone, and some say that they are just wandering cows.

My two favorite things about these cows are:

1- They walk on the side of the road (in US they are called sidewalks, but in India that hasn't been invented yet). They have acclimated to the traffic because otherwise the crazy honking drivers will just run 'em over, and the cows know it.

2 - They are always on the move - but my question is... where are they going?  It's not as if they are on they are headed to the green pasture around the bend.. however, there is a delicious smelling pile of garbage just a 1/2 block away.

Same diff to a skinny vile cow!

What do I love most about India?

Well- so far - it's my luggage... Why?  Because if you read my prior post, you noticed that I traveled for 4 days.. and all my bags were checked.  I had nothin'...  no deoderant, no fresh undies, etc. not even a comb.

The guy that I'm traveling with - said "oh, my step dad always told me to make sure I packed a set of clean clothes and all my toiletries in my carry on?"  I was like - "I don't have a step-dad, I just have a plain, regular old dad" you know - the kind that doesn't give you important travel tips. All I had in my carry on was 18 hard back books, 27 movies, my laptop and my blankie... 

Anyway - When I saw my big old giant blue bag on the luggage carousel - I shouted "come to Mama!" My luggage looked as happy to see me, as I was to see it!

Also - there were lots of lost luggage as well - but mine was safe and sound, undies and all!

Whew!

Hello and Dubai

I've had an interesting travel itinerary to get to India.  I left the SL International Airport on Saturday morning at 10:05 a.m. and arrived at the Chennai Airport on Wednesday at 2:15 a.m. Yep!  That's right - nearly 4 entire days to get to India.

The first leg of my trip was SLC to JFK - I arrived at JFK and had about a 4 hour layover. My boss had told me "you have to go to China Grille while you are in NYC".  Why not - I have 4 hours to blow!  So - I took a cab $60 each way ($45 +tolls and tips) into Manhattan and ate at the China Grille!  It was awesome!  I arrived back at JFK about 2 hours later -and much to my surprise the Departure board on the flight to Dubai said "Delayed - Next Day". 

I had to check into a hotel that night - which was 1000x better than sleeping on the floor in the airport (which many many other people did). 

I got back to the airport at 5:00 the next morning, and my flight left about 8:30 a.m. Unfortunately tho - this little delay meant that I could not leave Dubai for Chennai until 9:00 p.m. the next night, which meant I had an 18 hour layover in Dubai.  

The trip from JFK to Dubai was a 12 hour plane ride... Luckily I slept for the first 6, then watched "Enchanted and Juno" and about 6 episodes of friends, ate dinner (gross) read two

people magazines, fell back asleep, woke up and it was time to land.  

(BTW - I had a mom and her 3 year old daughter sitting next to me... let me just say this..

Moms - if you are taking your 3 year old child on a 12.5 hour plane ride... bring a freakin' book, puzzle, toy, whateva".)

Arrival in Dubai - again another check in at a hotel - but now I'm in the Middle East! How exotic.  So many Shieks - so little time!  I LOVED THE SHIEKS!  I saw about a million of them! It's illegal to take their picture, so I had to sort of pretend I was taking a picture of something else and they just happened to be in the way.  

After we checked in  - we went to the mall.  (we in this story = me and a guy I work with) The best part of this trip was coming back from the mall (not the mall itself).  We had to take a taxi to and from the mall, and when we went to catch a taxi to take us back to our hotel they told us that we had to go inside and there is an area where you pick up the taxi.  So - we got to the "taxi area" and we saw a line.  We were like "dang it" because there were about 15 people in line ahead of us.  What we didn't know was at the end of the line - the line turned...  This picture is the "actual line" - not the fake 15 people line.  There were about 400 people (not an exaggeration) in the taxi line.  We waited exactly 1 hour and 15 minutes to catch a cab for a taxi.

Hello, Hello... I don't know why you say Dubai - I say Hello!

Super Duper Models

These girls will do anything for me... even wear what they would call "dorky" and what I would call "totally cute" sailor hats.

New Beginnings was held on Sunday, March 2, and our theme this year for New Beginnings was "Steadfast in Him". We had a nautical theme, with anchor's, life preservers, etc. and as you can see... sailor hats! I could not resist posting this picture of a few of my beautiful girls in their value colored sailor hats!

I love these girls so much, they make life completely worth it!