The Neighbourhood

School work with the girls, and at Saint Anne's was much the same as usual today, so I thought we'd give a bit of a description of the walk to the school.

We are situated outside of the downtown area in a mostly residential neighbourhood, but there are many little shops too. As we walk along the road to school we get all kinds of honks. This is not a tribute to our ego, they honk at everyone. It means "get out of the way", or "go". People seem to drive with one hand on the horn and you could probably drive down the street blind because those beside you would honk to make sure you knew they were there. We cut across a park with rusted old equipment and make our way to a quieter street that the school is on.

There are women dressed in bright coloured saris. There are others dressed in black Islamic robes. There are men in traditional clothes too, but more often you see them in western style pants and shirts. There are kids running bare foot or in flip flops. Some are in their school uniforms, while others have already changed or are not attending school.

There are smells of leaves being burned and of animal manure. Sometimes you can smell someone cooking something. There is dust everywhere. In some of the small alley ways between buildings there are cows, goats or sheep. Not sure why, but many of the cows and sheep have yellow dye on them.

GS This is actually true. I've seen on several occasions kids playing with old tires, rolling and chasing them down the street! Many of the kids like to have our attention and call out "good afternoon" or "hello". They all seem to giggle when we return their greetings.

There are also tons of stray dogs around. Mangy cur is a term that would apply to most of them. Most snooze in the dirt or trot along looking for food. Many of them are pretty diseased looking, but nobody seems to do anything about the poor beasts.

Besides the horns and traffic sounds, you hear people talking, or laughing. You hear the kids whispering. In the early mornings we hear the morning call to prayer from our room, and in the evening you can also hear it. There are a lot of Muslim people here, although more are Hindu. We also often hear pots and pans being banged about and washed. There seems to be a hall next door and sometimes we hear music coming from it as well.

CM