Showing posts with label Durga. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Durga. Show all posts

Friday, July 11, 2014

Again...It's Been a While

Yes, yes, I know...I know...I've been crappy at keeping up with this blog, but give me some slack. I've been writing in my journal that I have here in India with me, as well as writing up field notes, so I may not always write to write again online. So yeah, just deal. Anyway, just want to let you all know that I am indeed alive and that this past week has been great actually. And I'll tell you why. :)

I haven't gotten a lot of interviews this week, but those that I have gotten have been so full of information and so amazing and just interesting! that I don't regret not having a lot to do. Relatively speaking anyway. I still have a lot to do, but it's just been so interesting and just so amazing!

Just some thoughts though, that I think I at least need to write down. First things first, leaving in another country...it's a bit like madness! Such a different culture, different food, and just everything is different. But it's a good thing, it's been stretching my mind as well as my opening my mind to other things that I would have never expected in this life. Don't get me wrong, this is a great experience! This has been an excellent experience for me and I am lucky and happy to have done this! Wow...so many exclamation points....

Thought number two: sometimes, there are personalities that don't quite mesh together the way that people want them too. Yes, these people can be the nicest, kindest, more adorable people in the world, but there's just something about them that will rub you wrong. And you have no idea what it is, but they will just rub you wrong. It can, and is, super annoying to deal with it. That's the thing about this Study Abroad for me. I have learned that there some very annoying people in the world, and you just have to deal with it. Even if that very annoying person is yourself. And it has been me, I can tell that I have been very annoying at times, as well as been very annoyed at others. I will say this though, I have learned how to better work with others, at least a little bit.

And my last thought: I have a little over 4 weeks left. I am ecstatic that I will soon be home with Richard and my friends again, but I am also a little sad that I will be leaving those people that I have made friends with here as well. Like the girls in the house, Durga, Gowri, and Sailaja. They have become my friends and I don't want to leave them. And I can't forget Mumuksha. He's Durga's baby boy and I have grown so attached to that little boy that it's going to be hard to leave. It's one thing to say that I'll be a little glad to leave India. It's a completely different thing to say that I'll be glad to leave these wonderful people behind, which I won't be. I feel like I've come to know them in such a way that I don't want to leave them. But I'll have to. This chapter of my life will be closing soon and so I'll have to. This has been an amazing chapter!

I know that I sounded really depressing just now, but trust me, I'm not. I glad to have been able to come to India and to experience something that will both further the use of my education as well as make me a better person in general. At least, I hope that is what will happen.

Talk to you soon,
Ashley


Sunday, May 18, 2014

Picture Time

I figured I should try and upload some pictures today. That way everyone can see what it is that I'm doing here. At least some of what I'm doing. And don't worry, I'll be adding more pictures as time goes on! :)

Talk to you soon,
Ashley :)


There are other girls that I am sharing an apartment with:
Kendra on the left, Lizzie in the center, and Jamie with
Momoksha on the right. They're all working on a diabetes
project with one of the guys, Oliver.

Temple at Momoksha's rice feeding ceremony
Durga, our cook, wearing her new apron that we gave
her as a gift.
This is Siddhu and he's Durga's oldest boy. 
Two skulls of an adult baleen whale and a baby baleen
whale that we saw that the department at Zoology at Andhra
University, where one of our translators, Suddha, works.

This is Oliver, the guy working on the diabetes project with
the girls that I share an apartment with. He's standing in
front of the Sai Baba temple. It's across the street from the
house of one of my informants.
CATTLE!!! There are literally cows, cattle, water buffalo, just
about everywhere here! It's kind of cool, you just have to watch
your step to make sure you don't step in a cow pie... O.o