What do I have to say this week?

I have not posted an entry lately since I am not real sure what to share right now. We have not had too much happening here. We have a pretty good routine now.

We booked our tickets for another fun-filled family destination! We are going to Borneo. One of the seasons of Survivor was filmed here, and it looks beautiful. Waterfalls, blue water, sandy beaches, and relaxation - YEAH! We will only have 4 weeks left before we leave for Michigan.

I have been busy planning summer when we are home. One of the things we are planning to do is go to Dollywood. The fun part of the planning is working with my parents from Michigan and my sister from Florida. This is easier when you are in the same time zone but being half way around the world requires some thinking. We do research, email, skype, and call. Good thing we have Vonage, and there are no fees for international calling. I do have a short story to go with this. I had found some places that looked promising. I emailed my sister in the morning (India time), and she emailed me back later. I tried to call her but I had no phone. I then decided to email her, but I again had no internet connection. Guess what, my help desk was not available (Charles had a business dinner), so I used my blackberry and responded to her email. I told her to get on Skype. After about 15 minutes, we were able to make a connection on Skype. She surfed the internet why we talked. Thank goodness for technology in all forms! We have narrowed down our search, and I will have to call her tonight to make our final decision.

M has been busy making her plans as well. She informed me today that she will have a nice break from her parents this summer (meaning Charles and me). She has two friends in Michigan that will take her different weeks. I asked her about food, washing her clothes, etc. She told me that they would take care of her. I wonder if the parents are aware of the plans they have concocted!

N has a volleyball tournament Mother's Day weekend. I am not sure if we will be hosting any students this time, but it should be a good weekend. He is certainly impressed with his "awesomeness" as he puts it! I cannot wait to see it as well. They really do not play any games other than the tournament.

E is busy perfecting her swimming skills, learning to play the bongo drums, and paper quilling. She has made some really impressive cards.

Charles' has been working and tinkering with some computer projects at home. I am not sure what he has been really doing since I do not understand it, but he finds it fun.

That just leaves me. I went scrapbooking this week. That was fun. I really enjoy it, but I have not had much opportunity to spend working on my pictures since we got here. I am working on a really cool slideshow. With my new computer that Charles bought me, it is easy to make the movie. I plan to have pictures printed and the movie made to show you all back home. I also have a weekly Bible study with my friends.

I am looking forward to getting back home and cooking some of our favorites. I made chocolate chip cookies yesterday, but it took forever! I can only make 6 cookies at a time, and my recipe makes about 3 dozen or so. I have discovered some new recipes since being here. I make my own sour cream. I am not sure if I have shared that piece of information with you yet or not. I am going to try to make my Tiramisu dessert, but the pound cake will have to be made from scratch. Then I have to convert to celsius and convection cooking.

Here is another funny story. I asked my driver yesterday to get some items while we was out. He had to pick up something for Charles, and I knew it was not close. I figured that he could just stop at the fruit and vegetable market to get some items. I needed red, green, and yellow peppers for Fajitas. When he returned home, he showed me the pepper. Well, it was pepper that you grind as a seasoning. Of course, they do have a couple different colors, so he picked them up. Well, here in India peppers are capsicums. He told me large chili peppers. We were able to find some peppers, and we also returned the regular pepper.

Living here is different. I sometimes feel bad to have my driver to my errands, but he likes to help out. I really do not like having a housekeeper when I am home scrapbooking, working on the computer, etc. It is just a weird feeling. N said that he felt sorry for Shanthi the other day because of all the dishes. I told him he could have offered to do them, but he said, "No Way!, I just feel sorry for her."

Stay tuned....

What have the Marshalls been up to?

I am sorry for the delay in getting another blog entry posted. I have been busy. That did not take long (4 months). I have met some really amazing people, and they are helping me to experience Chennai at its best! So what have we been doing?

N is playing volleyball now. I cannot wait to see his game, since all the reports (of course from him) are, "You should have seen my spike!". I am glad he has such a positive attitude. Everything is pretty much the same for him as they were in Michigan. Lots of friends and just as goofy as ever.

M is enjoying her new friendships, and she is making her summer plans. Ouch! She is getting older. I may not see her at all this summer when we are in Michigan. I am glad she will be able to enjoy time with all her Michigan friends. School is the same for her here as it was in Michigan. The middle school has been working on e-portfolio, which is done entirely by the students with some guidance from their advisory teachers. She is excited to share this with us. It is basically a student led conference.

The entire school does Battle of the Books. The students are teamed up and have a set number of books that they have to read. E's team did not miss a single question, and they came in 1st place. She won Rs 400 (Rupees) to be used at the next book fair. She was pretty excited since she was the leader of the team, and the team was not always willing to meet when she called a meeting. She is also in a class called exploring the drums. She has a set of bongos now.

Charles is just busy with work as well as having committee meetings with the staff when he gets home. We have had a lot of electrical issues, and we are also having a water pipe issue. Never a dull moment around here.

I have been cardmaking as well as hanging out with my friends. We had a PTA ball last weekend. It was a blast, but we had a lot of prep work for it. Of course the prep work took us to far ends of Chennai where you can really experience Chennai. The smells, the people, the busyness, the sounds, etc. We raised a lot of money for the school which is an awesome thing. Charles and I had some cool outfits. I will share those pictures soon.

It will be hard to explain our day to day life here unless you are able to experience it first hand, but I will share some fun things. I ran out of the cardstock needed to complete my project. I gave a piece of cardstock to my driver to see if he could get me some more. There are no scrapbooking stores in Chennai. I told him that it could be a little bigger, but I need it to be the same thickness. He called me later in the day to report that he found some, but it was bigger than the piece that I gave him, but he assured me it was the same thickness. I told him that would work. When I got home, I saw what he bought. It was bigger than the size of posterboard back in the states. It was about the right thickness. Well, I did say that a little bigger was okay. Unfortunately my cutting systems do not cut pieces that big. Oh well, I made it work and it is finished.

I am not sure if I will get used to the garbage all around or the crazy driving, but we are settling in and handling things as well as can be expected here. I am getting used to the many animals that roam the streets. Our pool is nice, so we may have to have a pool when we return to Michigan.

There are only 7 and 1/2 weeks left of school. We will board a plane that night and head to London. We are staying in London for 5 days and Paris for 5 days before returning to Michigan. We are getting excited for the return home.

Spring Break 2010

I am sorry it has taken so long to get this update together. It has been a busy week.

We returned home on Saturday from a two week excursion in China. We started in Hong Kong. Hong Kong was great. We stayed at the Hollywood Hotel, a Disney Resort. Disney even had its own train and train depot! Hong Kong Disney was a lot smaller, but it was a blast. The kids rode everything, and we saw the Golden Mickeys show. E even danced with the High School Musical 3 dancers. We saw Minnie, Mickey, Goofy, Stitch, and Alice in Wonderland.

We found an Outback Steakhouse the first night there. It tasted delicious. The city was amazing at night, but it was still too busy for my taste. We walked around the city seeing all the shopping malls. It was amazing to see just how many shopping spots they have in one city.

I just want to highlight some of the places that we went. This entry could go on for days otherwise. We went to Victoria's Peak. It is one of the highest points to lookout and see the city. We ventured in the evening, so it was all lit up. Instead of climbing up the side of the Peak, we rode a train. It was pretty cool. Once up, we could go up a few more flights to the lookout area. Just one of those amazing scenes you see on the postcards.

We went on a half day dolphin watch to see pink dolphins. It took quite a while to finally locate the sea creatures, but it was pretty awesome. They did not get too close to our boat, but I did manage to get some decent pictures. We also saw fishing boats and shipping boats. After that exciting adventure, we got brave and took a cable car over land and sea to get to the Giant Buddha. An amazing view as we rode the cable car to our destination. I am not sure how many steps it takes to get to the base of the statue, but it did leave us out of breath. We finished out our week enjoying more of the city by bus along with a ferry ride to the avenue of stars. We saw Jackie Chan and Bruce Lee's star and handprint. We also went to the Ladies Market to do some shopping.

After a week in Hong Kong, we went to Beijing. The weather was a lot cooler, so we needed to purchase some jackets. That was quite the experience for the entire family. You need to really bargain and haggle to get low prices even though it is all knockoffs! We climbed the Great Wall. It was another take your breath away literally moment. I wonder how many steps we climbed this whole vacation. The ride up was by cable car (really just a ski lift). What a spectacular view! Our ride down was by a toboggan.

It was rainy the next day, so we decided to do some indoor activities. I had read about an chocolate theme park. It just opened in January. All the exhibits are made out of chocolate. Needless to say that was a big disappointment, but a great story. I have included some of the pictures that I took that day. Of course it is cold because you do not want chocolate to melt. The place looked like it had been open for years.

We did the usual sites in Beijing that all tourists do - Tianamen Square, Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven, Summer Palace, and the Bird's Nest Olympic Stadium. So much history in this part of the world.

It was a good trip. We were happy to be heading home. I hope you enjoy the pictures. Just click here.