S'more Photos

Still working on the photos. It will take some time. Patience. But here are some little ones to view for now till I get everything loaded up to Flickr.

OK, following is a mishmash of photos.

The First Bus

There were about 60 people staying in Hephzibah's parent's place. They all arrived on buses.

Me Doing Something Strange

Waiting For The Bride

Standing to the right of me is Tony. Tony is from our church in Goa. Everyone thought he was a pastor so he ended up sitting up front for the entire service. He was asked to pray during the service. This is a really funny thing if you know Tony. He was quite uncomfortable, but did it.

The Guests

There were only two white people in the building. One was me and the other was the photographer. Sadly, there are no photos of him. Shoot. Jules from England. I met him on the beach in November. He is a long timer in Goa like me. Good man.

Hephzibah With Cousin And Sister

Inside

On The Stage

Stephen, from our church, is to the right of Hephzibah. He was a translating machine for two hours! People stood up, people sat down. But Stephen was there the entire time. Amazing.

Before The Rings

Garlands

They smelled good but you can't imagine how heavy they were! Oh, and here is the "chair". Kind of nice because you are expected to sit in it for certain portions of the ceremony but then you realize that you are sitting in something with lions on the armrests.

Angel, Leena, John and Stephen

This was absolutely awesome for me. Angel and Leena (her sisters) and John and Stephen (from my church) singing together.

Reentry

After all the formalities, Hephzibah left and then returned 15 minutes later in her second sari. Then we talked with all the guests.

Meet and Greet

My Goa Family

Near The End

Still many, many photos missing. Please be patient with me.

Two Quick Photos

Remind me again why I thought editing my own wedding photos would be a good idea?

We arrived back in Goa, tonight. Here are two for you to look at.

So there is no confusion, I will explain that Hephzibah wore two saris for the wedding. I will go further into detail on this fact tomorrow.

Near The Beginning Of The Ceremony

After The Ceremony

View quality images on my Flickr page.

I will be putting in a lot more hours editing these pics tomorrow. Check back later.

Congratulations!!!

Congratulations to Phil and Marj on their first!

Isabel Bonnie Crider

Inspiration

I had no power all day. Seriously, it has been over 24 hours with no electricity. My only assignment for today was to clean my place up a bit. Sounds easy? Well, imagine cleaning your bathroom, kitchen and dishes for 3 hours with no electricity. I had to use candles. Candles! And, trust me, candles are worthless for cleaning. They did make the place smell nice though.

So after the outside natural light got too dark, I had to put a halt to cleaning. What to do. Now, 10 PM, the power is starting to tease me. On for 5 minutes, then off for 10 minutes, repeat.

After putting some of my cleaning tasks behind me, I wasn't left with many options. A lot of rain outside, no power inside. So I sketched some more...


This started out as only the top third, then I decided to read the story of Noah from Genesis. This explains the chubby rain droplets. And the bottom third is inspired by my favorite work, Hokusai's The Great Wave.

View Big Here.

And now... the power is back on. I told myself I wouldn't get up until after it stays on for 30 minutes. I've been hurt too many times.

In other news, John and I head out for Karnataka tomorrow after the morning church service. We will arrive around 4 in the afternoon. There shouldn't be too much excitement for us on Sunday. Then on Monday, John and I have to make sure the flower/decoration guy doesn't bring anything pink into the hall assist the flower/decoration guy. And in the afternoon, I am greeting five of my friends at the train station. These are my jewelery shop friends that I haven't seen in over three months. They live about three hours East of where the wedding will be held. We will spend the evening catching up. And then, Tuesday is Tuesday.

Khushi For Josh

It has been raining too much here. I was complaining about it to Josh Frederick, my Ohio buddy. He said I should crack open the ol' sketchbook. So I did. And then I managed to spell Josh's last name incorrectly. Snap. Oh, and ignore the mess in the top right. That was my pallet where I was mixing my paints. Silly, that's not paint.

View it large here.

Nothing else to report. Raining, cleaning, listening to music. The power has been out quite a bit the past couple days. For several hours at a time. Normally I would just go outside, but all the rain! I think this sketchbook was given to me by someone. Hmmm... Who was that?

One Week Left...

It is raining. I am tired of using exclamation marks. It is simply raining, a lot. All the time. It is everywhere. The two blurry photos, following, were taken this afternoon. The first takes place in front of my current residency. It is our landlord's mother's house. Notice the attractive and fashionable blue tarp. All of the houses and shops have them up this season. They are sooooo IN right now. The tarps are to keep rain and winds from sneaking in through windows and the like.


Next, this photo takes place behind me. There is a huge field dedicated to monsoon season league football games. I was watching it for some time, laughing every time someone fell in the mud, before I decided I should get the camera. These games will happen almost every day for the next three months.


This is kinda a mish-mash of things today. And if you were wondering, I seem to have gotten an anonymous sponsor in yesterday's post's comments. I don't know the full details or how this will work itself out, but I am back on the home connection. This means, more convenient, more frequent and more pictures. Thanks, whoever you are!

Sooooooo...

I went to Karnataka from Wednesday to Saturday. Busy, busy. We got a lot of things done. And I got out of there! There were a couple things left to get for the wedding but my presence would only make those things more complicated. So, I am back home for now. I head back, with John, on Sunday. John and I are in charge of decorations and flowers. Ha! Two guys. It is going to be AMAZING!!!

Below is a photo taken in front of the hall where the ceremony will be held. So many trees. What to do? They were planted in a grid formation. I say, neat-o.

On the little lone plate, in the middle of the bed, you will see something wonderful. Gobi Manchuri! My new "must have" food when I go to Karnataka. It is cauliflower-goodness cooked to a tender crisp in a sweet red sauce. We made the mistake of only picking up 4 plates in the local market.

Angel, Hephzibah, Stephen, Franky and Mother Esther

Below, I was having a wonderful conversation with Angel, while Franky kept my sleeping area warm for me.

Franky and Angel

Hey, I have an idea. It might be good for me to introduce some of these new people to you. Angel, my sister, is 19. She is the second oldest out of five siblings. She is engaged to Prebu who attends her father's church. Their wedding will be in the soon. Like her two sisters, her singing voice is beautiful! She dreams of going to Australia to school at Hillsong. She is profound and tends to blow my mind. I love our conversations. She probably has the best grasp of the English language out of the whole family. This was a key ingredient to us connecting on my first visit to their house. I talked to her for many hours those first couple o' days. When I call her "my sister", no joke.

And I really have no reason for this last photo. We were just waiting around for Angel and Prebu to show up after talking with the flower and decorations guy.

So, like I said, I am back in Goa for the week with not much to do. John headed to Karnataka for his own "mission". He will be back on Wednesday. This will be a strange week at the center. Then, John and I head back to Karnataka on Sunday, afternoon.

Wet

I have been without good internet connection this past week. I had to put a temporary freeze on my home connection to cut costs for the next month. So, whatever updates you read on here for the next while will be done from the internet shop. Less convenient, less frequent and less pictures. Sorry.

I returned from Karnataka last night. Rain!!!! The entire drive. It was no fun.

I would estimate that about 90% of the preparations are done for the wedding. To be honest, I am exhausted, tired, poor and permanently wet from driving in the rain every day for the past week or more.

There are nine days left. Then I can wash my hands of all of this and get back to reality. Awesome reality! THANK GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

See? Now I am upset. I have some nice photos to put up and I can't. Patience, patience. I will solve these things.

One interesting thing...

This entire experience has given me a lot of things to chew on. Why do we do the things we do that make up a wedding? Why all of those little little things that make up the whole? All the things that people expect to see when they go to a wedding. The wedding cliches, if you will. One example is the veil. I was surprised to find out that a veil was still needed even though Hephzibah would be wearing a sari. I think the veil is dumb and wouldn't have even thought about it on my own, but it is needed. So my argument is that i hate stupid traditions that probably had some meaning or use in the past but that nobody even understands now. The veil, now, is just one more thing that you have to put money towards. Or, why the rings? I know, I know, they are circles and this reminds us of things that are circular like how our love should have no beginning or end. But the reality of it is that it is just one more thing that we have to pay money for and to impress people. This is stupid. Does any wife really think the size of their diamond equals the love that their husband has for them? So why go in debt for it? Even though rings are the norm here, we are not going to have them cause they cost money and I can't explain the need for them in my own head even if we could afford them. I think what I am getting to is, having to do all of this while trying to stick to a budget has made me think about every single thing that is "needed" or "expected" at a wedding. I have decided that the wedding doesn't really happen until after everything is over and all the guests are going home. Everything before that point is fake. The end. The internet shop is closing for lunch and I have to do spellcheck.

Rerun Video

This first video is a repeat from June 4th. Hephzibah singing with her sisters, Leena and Angel

Another Video

Franky on rhythm. Hephzibah and John singing and forgetting the words and having difficulties with the book. This video cracks me up!

Only Some New Pics On Flickr...

I added some new photos on my Flickr page. Nothing new, I think. Just bigger old stuff.


Nothing else to report. Easy day. I got some new rain gear. It's blue? Really, I don't have much to say. Ha!

Lazy Goan (Sun)day

Raining this morning. It would have been no problem except that my rain gear tore in half on my trip home from Karnataka, yesterday. Heavy wind does strange things to plastic clothing. So, I had two options: ride my Activa to the center and dodge all the raindrops or hitchhike with Augustine, my landlord's brother. In short, I got a free taxi ride to the center this morning. Much appreciated, Augustine.

At 9:30, attendance was quite low. At 9:35, the rain slowed down. People started to trickle in. Ha! Trickle. Get it? I guess this is one of the things you have to deal with when you're working in a dynamic climate like the one Goa has.

John, Stephen, Sangeeta and I got things done. I must admit all of this traveling is quite draining on me. Luckily, I got a good bit of sleep in this afternoon. And tomorrow will be pretty light, thankfully.

Tuesday, I'm heading in town to get measured for a suit. Should be pretty painless. After this, I'll be meeting with a Mr. Pastor Walter of Margao. He's good friends with my father and will be helping me by writing a letter to the pastor in Karnataka who will be performing the ceremony on the 26th. It's a standard formal letter that needs to be signed by five other people before being handed in. Basically, a letter stating that I am who I say I am, etc.

I slept from noon to 6. It was amazing. Then I headed up to the beach. This was happening when I arrived...

Karnataka Road Trip Part 4

On Thursday, I headed out for Karnataka alone. Took the motor scooter again. No John. Way too much rain!!! Pulled over by the police!!! I'm starting to get really good at clever-talk with the police here. I buttered my way out of paying 500 rupees. OK, this makes it look like I was doing something wrong. I wasn't, they just wanted money for their pockets, like usual here. They said there was a 500 rupee tax for out-of-state vehicles. OK. I said I would be happy to pay any amount but that I would need a receipt for my payment. In case I got pulled over again further down the road. Then I could show them proof that I already paid. This is my classic trap for the police. Ha! See, they don't want to give you any documentation of the payment cause it is all shady. They're afraid that I could easily take this paper to someone and then they would get in trouble. So, they said 200 rupees would solve all of my problems and they would let me leave. I said sure and I would need a receipt. They told me to "Chalo!" Ha!

I decided not to bring my laptop for this trip and it ended up being a good decision. Rain! Chubby rain! I had rain gear on and everything probably would have been cool, but it wouldn't have been the best feeling in the world to be on the road for 4 hours driving through puddles and being splashed by trucks knowing that i have a computer on my back. That's why the no posting.

So...

Thursday was all laziness upon arriving in Kanapur, Karnataka. No business talk. Food!!!

Friday, I hit the market in Belgaum with Hephzibah and her sister, Angel. Somehow Angel fell into the job of being my translator on these adventures. Translator is India code for "it's not proper for a boy and a girl to be going out together alone." OK by me, Angel is awesome!

Bussn'

I wouldn't be caught dead shopping for wedding dresses in America. I think I've seen too many wedding themed sitcoms in my lifetime. I'm spooked. But wedding sari shopping is a completely different thing. For starters, there is this totally awesome room full of floor cushions. You sit there, relaxing, and then Master G. K. comes out with a bunch of boxes.

Master G. K. and the Room of Saris

He pulls out the saris, one at a time, and flips them into the air. The light hits it just right and the air slows its fall. It lands perfectly in your lap. All shiny-like. After this happens fifty times or so, you have two huge piles of saris. The "keep and think" pile and the "meh" pile.

Important point, we are shopping for two saris. A white one that she'll wear for the first half of the ceremony and a colored one that will wrap up the service. It's supposed to be symbolic. So, along with the two dress thing, you can also throw out almost everything you know of what a wedding should look like. It has been an interesting time for me. A time of re-evaluating and re-processing all those little things that go into a traditional wedding. The wedding that you expect to see when you go to a wedding. What do all these little things mean? And what happens when some of them aren't there? What happens when there are new little things? What are their meanings? Why do we do them? Interesting.

The Colored Sari

I could have sat there all day watching G. K. work those saris like the true master that he is, but we came to a decision on the two saris.

Colored Sari

This is the colored sari. The second sari. The next photo will make more sense.

Colored Sari Up Close

White Sari Up Close

We also bought the locket portion of the Mangalsutra necklace. This was a complicated experience. The weather started to get angry so we headed home with only the locket and no necklace. You don't get to see the Mangalsutra! Secrets. Surprises.

Today, Thursday, Hephzibah and I headed back to the market to finish things up. I was allowed to go without the aid of my "translator"! This was appreciated because we really had a lot of things to accomplish and not a lot of time. I wanted to head back to Goa by 4 o' clock so that I wouldn't have to drive in the dark. Sometimes it's just easier to make complicated decisions with less opinions in the room. Not that I don't appreciate Angel's opinion. Angel is amazing!

Delicious Egg Pattie

Every market worth it's salt has a nice, dirty hole-in-the-wall shop where you can pick up a couple in-between-meals snacks. I fell in love with the Egg pattie. Imagine a croissant with a hard boiled egg inside. That's it. Nothing complicated. But... fantastic!!!

We finished all of our requirements for the day and headed home. No, I'm not going to show the Mangalsutra! Stop asking!

Getting Mother Esther's Approval

Back home, we showed Mother all of the goodies; saris, sandals, etc. In the top right, you can see Prebu (Angel's dude) helping out Steven with covering his school books. Prebu is cool like that.

Above, my beautiful sister, Leena, missed out on all the shopping fun. She was busy all day applying for some kind of nursing program.

OK, that's enough sari photos. Cause, really, these small pics don't do them any justice at all.

I headed home. Rain. Wet. Slow. I had dinner with John in Colva. Chatted. Now, tired.

News

So nobody took the bait from my last post. Or it was too obscure...

Who: Cameron and Hephzibah
What: Good Stuff
When: June 26th
Where: Belgaum, Karnataka, India
How: And How
Why: Cause November is like 300 years away!!!

Won't u come?

Back To Goa, Again

A different type of Goa from what I normally see. Our bottoms kept hurting on this trip. So, every thirty minutes or so, we would take a break and look around for a while.

Karnataka Road Trip Part 3... Day 2

I managed to get exactly one hour of sleep last night. I can't really explain it. I woke up to the loudest house, ever! Nobody here has nice inside voices! Cameron is still sleeping voices! It is 7:30 voices!!!

Putting on the School Uniforms

Above is Steven and Franky getting ready for school. Loud getting ready!

Hephzibah Eating Lunch

After the house got a bit emptier, we all had a light lunch before our much needed afternoon naps.

Cameron vs the Pink Wall

No Batteries

John, my travel buddy, all bummed out after trying 20 some batteries. Why do people insist on keeping dead batteries in their house? It just leads to sadness, example in above photo.

Mangalsutra

In India, you don't go ring shopping. You go Mangalsutra shopping. If you are Indian, a woman and married you have one of these around your neck. We checked out a couple jewelery shops tonight in town. I had no idea what to expect. You pick out the style of necklace that you like, then look for a complementary locket. There is everything under the sun to choose from. The only constant is the black and gold color scheme. And the necklace is pretty long even though the photo doesn't really show that. A learning experience. Bought nothing.

Johns, Hephzibas, Angels and Camerons

After looking around the market for an hour, we headed into this sweet place for some foodz. They had a really nice elevator with mirrors. Mmmmmm...

View it all big-like here.

John and Franky

Why does every photo with John include props and appear posed? Franky sleeping.

Stick Bug

Steven found a sweet stick bug at some point while were were out. It's a beast!

So, that's day two with the quickness. Some things were discussed, some decisions were made, some food was had. More info later. Promise.

John and I head back to Goa too early in the morning. Hoping for no rain.

FYI: Hephzibah is technically pronounced Hef-zi-ba. But here, people seem to really like to hit that "P". It ends up sounding more like Hep-si-ba. I guess if you get asked the same question in 30 different emails in one day, you should probably answer it.

Karnataka Road Trip Part 3

Today, after the Sunday morning service, I was looking at the sky. Excellent weather. It had been raining chubby rain for the past three days. The clear sky gave me an idea. I went home, got my gear together, called up John and we hit the road. A visit to Karntataka was most urgent sometime this week, but the nice weather made today a practical option. And we ditched the bus! Four hours on a Honda Activa Motor Scooter!

John Wearing the Coolest Shades, Ever!!! Jealous.

The View From the Scooter

John Drumming

After four hours of sweet driving and cool mountain weather, we arrived at our destination. Pastor Aaron's place. Hephziba's place. I know too many musically inclined people. After having some light snacks, everyone started singing. Other than me. I took pics to keep myself occupied.

Leena, Hephzibah and Angel

Hephzibah with my two sisters. Awesome people. And did I forget to mention that the weather today was AMAZING!!!! It was AMAZING!!!!

Kanada Song Book

River Rocks

We took a short taxi trip to a nearby Hindu temple. Some steps led to these huge rocks and a beautiful river.

Awesomeness

John After Almost Falling In

Leena and Pastor Aaron Gettin' Down

While all the children were out exploring, Mother Esther was busy cooking up some mean beef curry rice chapatis and salad. Goodness.

Yeah, it's 4:56 AM. It's been a really long day. Sleep now...

And if you are really really confused, this may help.

Update: Here for an awesome video.