Gitam Unviersity and Sand Crabs

So, yesterday there wasn't a blog post for two reasons:

1) It was a long and busy day

2) I don't really have an excuse other than we didn't make it to the cafe...

Anyway, my adventures yesterday dealt with tagging along with the public health students and the beach. We had a bit of a full day. We first went to Gitam University Hospital. One of their main sources, a man called Dr. Prabrakah (?) had invited us to come visit the hospital that he is helping with. It's still being built at the moment, but some of it is in operation already. They are also building a medical college to be right next to the hospital as well that will house 150 students and they'll be able to do their residency at the Gitam Hospital. That is impressive, as is the hospital itself. It's going to be 12 stories high, as well as have measures in place to move their patients from floor to floor in case the power goes out, which happens quite a lot here. It's already gone out twice today.

Anyway, after Gitam Hospital, we went to Gitam University to our translator, Suddha's, house for lunch. Her and her husband, Dr. Krishnayya's brother, had invited us to lunch with them, and boy, did they provide us a lunch of a life time. They literally fed us till we were stuffed and then some. We first had a really delicious vegetable soup, then these pieces of chicken. We then had a mutton and chicken roll-up. It resembled a burrito, other than the fact that it was Indian. After that came the main course of rice, always, and several sauces/meats that we mix into the rice to eat. It was delicious, but a lot of food. They take lunch here very seriously, it's their biggest meal of the day. And then we had fruit salad and ice cream for dessert. That was lunch!!! It seemed, quite literally, a feast! And it was delicious! I love the food here. It's cool though, you are expected to usually eat with your right hand here. Your left hand shouldn't touch your food, as your left hand is thought to be dirty, nor should it touch the serving bowl, spoon, or anything else for that matter really. So, Richard, you might have a little bit of trouble trying to eat here. ;)

After that delicious, delicious, lunch, we headed back to the apartments, took a shower, which felt great! Then we all headed to the beach. Funny story first though. On the way home from Suddha's we actually got a ride from the Gitam Hospital Ambulance. So image Sallaja and Gowri's worry when an ambulance pulls up in front of the house and we start piling out of it. Sallaja and Gowri are Durga's helpers, just so you know. But once we explained that we were just riding in it, that no one was actually hurt, they both started cracking up. I love it when they love, they just let it all out, it's just fun to laugh and get them to laugh. :) 

So, the beach. There's a beach within walking distance here, and everyone takes advantage of it. Now, let me tell you something. The first time we went, it was late in the afternoon of a very hot day and I was very cranky. So this time, I really didn't want to go, but I did so anyway. I am glad that I did. It was worth it this time. We left for the beach at about 4:00 4:30 yesterday afternoon and walked the beach. It's about a 15-20 minute walk, and we have to go through a beautiful park to do so. We ended up taking a lot of pictures, both in the park and at the beach. It's cool though, I told you that people here love taking pictures with us and shaking our hands, right? Well, in the park, a man pulled his two little boys up to us and asked us to shake their hands. We did so, then he asked if we could take a picture with them. It was kind of cute, as the littlest boy didn't want to shake our hands or take a picture with us. :) Then once we got down to the beach, Oliver was taking pictures of Lizzie, Kendra, and I and another family, a mother this time, brought up her two little girls to take pictures with us. Only this time, I took the pictures, as did Oliver, and we just showed her the pictures. So if you even just show them the pictures here, they're happy. It's pretty cool.

A really cool, old Lighthouse that they have
on the beach. It's not in use anymore, but it
looks awesome!

We then walked about the beach, taking pictures and being dorks. Just doing things that everyone does at the beach, and we finally found Weston and Jamie. We had gotten separated from them in the park, but we all ended up near the lighthouse that is one the beach there. So we took pictures of everyone and just enjoyed our time there. By the time we started heading back, it was getting dark and the crabs were coming out. There were sand crabs EVERYWHERE! They're the same colour as the sand, right? So you can just barely see

them, especially with the light leaving. But it was cool to just watch them scurry out of the way as we walked along to beach back to the park. There was a funny part though. The sand crabs are usually pretty good at moving out of the way so as not to get stepped on. But one moved in the exact wrong direction, and Jamie stepped on it! I have no idea why I thought that was funny, but it was! Jamie had stepped on crab. :)

I'm glad to tag along with the health students whenever possible, but I'm actually starting up on my own work now. I had my first interview today with a man named Dr. Sutta Paul. He's an anthropology professor at Andhra University and he's very interested in the caste system, and knows a lot about it, but he does not like it. he's very much against the caste system. But he is helping me understand how it works and what sorts of things happen in cross-caste marriage and what sorts of cross-caste marriages are allowed more often than others. He's going to be an excellent source for my project.

So that was a lot of adventures yesterday, and the beach was awesome!

Talk to you soon,

Ashley