Destiny!

First things first, we’re sure you’re all dying to know how the potty training’s going.  Well, we kept Daisy at home last week, to really focus on it, but she’s back at nursery this week, and dry most of the time (still nappies at night though).  She’s using the toilet, rather than a potty now, and hardly has any ‘wet’ accidents, but unfortunately, poos are still a bit more hit and miss, but she’s getting there.  Too much information?

Toilet training in full swing!

Talking of training, Neil’s been involved in a couple of Air Wing exercises over the last 2 weeks, in both of which he’s been given the position of a 2-star!  As I’m sure you can imagine, he has been loving it, particularly as the last week has seen him play the Chief Engineer!  He almost got to wear the rank slides as well, but the DS took pity on Louise, realising he’d be unbearable, and it didn’t happen.  Much to Neil’s disappointment!

Last week, we also had our first Indian Dining-In Night.  It was called a Training Dining Night and we weren’t to have fun!   Louise wore her Mum’s beautiful lemon chiffon sari embroidered with pink flowers, which is now almost 40 years old, and Neil got to wear his Tropical Mess Dress, so we both looked very smart, and got lots of nice comments, although Neil was on the receiving end of a few ‘waiter’ jokes.  It was a quite dry evening – only 2 small glasses of wine per person were allowed, there were no speeches, and we were home by 9:30pm!  The Australians and ourselves did try to go to the bar after dinner, but it was all shut up, so we got the message and had an early night!

Before the Dinner Night

 It was probably for the best, as Neil had the following day off, so we headed to Destiny Farmstay, near Avalanche, for a night.  It’s in the middle of nowhere, and after getting dropped off at their car park, we were taken, by ageing 4-tonne truck with seats, up the last, very bumpy 3 kms of road to the farm.  Destiny is in a beautiful location, right on the edge of a lake, with no other buildings around it.  It only has 25 rooms, so it’s very small and quiet.  The food is excellent, and we had lunch overlooking the lake, or what there was of it due to the drought, as soon as we arrived, before settling into our room. Unfortunately, the rain also settled in as we arrived, and it didn’t really stop raining all weekend.  This didn’t bother Daisy though, so we put on our raincoats and went and fed the ducks, walked through their HUGE vegetable patch (Len would love it!), watched cows being milked, saw horses and sheep, and even found a kitten that looked suspiciously like a short-haired, much smaller version of Jacko!  Anandh came to babysit whilst we had dinner, and then we settled into our room, lit the fire and watched it burn until we fell asleep. 

The next day it was still raining, but we had another walk around the property before going home.   As usual, all the Indian staff at Destiny loved Daisy and Ava, and Daisy had a great time playing with all the reception staff, which gave us a few minutes of peace and quiet every now and again!  On the way home we stopped in Ooty to buy all the tonic water we could lay our hands on – another drink in short supply here!

Daisy and her friends at Reception



That day was also Singapore’s national day, and the Singaporean officer on the course hosted a party that night.  He had really gone to town decorating his garden with banners, fairy lights, tables and chairs and an awning in case of rain, and had invited all the international students and a fair number of the Indian students as well.  He also had lots of wine and a great buffet, so everyone had a good night.

Louise, Elaine and Nicola

Ian, Neil, Harvey and Chris

Unfortunately Neil has suffered the family’s first real bout of Delhi Belly this week, which has been accompanied by fever, high temperatures and general malaise.  I know some of you may not see too much difference in this to Neil’s normal approach to work, but he has been a little poorly.  However, the reporting sick procedure here is quite rigid.  With Neil feeling quite ill, he had to dress in full uniform and report to the Medical Centre.  Once seen by the doctor, a wide range of drugs were dispensed and he then had to report to his DS Co-ord to inform him that he had been signed off Sick-in-Quarters for 24 hrs; only at this stage was Neil excused lectures.  Quite a painful process, particularly when you consider that the college is a considerable drive from home when you’re not feeling too well.  At times, being at the College is like being at Primary School.   That said, the medical staff here are brilliant, and Neil was seen straight away and is now well on the road to recovery.

It seems as though the monsoon may finally have arrived, 10 weeks late.  All the locals were getting very worried about how dry it’s been, although we weren’t complaining, but since last weekend when we went to Destiny, we’ve had a few days or afternoons of very heavy, prolonged periods of rain.  It’s still not proper monsoon weather of raining for 3 or 4 days non-stop though, but who knows what it will be like when our next guests arrive in September and October.

Whilst she’s been kept indoors by the weather, Louise has been busy planning our next holidays.  We’re flying to Mumbai for a long weekend at the end of this month, and are also planning our Christmas break in Kerala and Goa at the moment.  Neil’s got 3 weeks off for Christmas so we’re really looking forward to doing a bit of sightseeing, seeing some beaches and spending a night on a houseboat on the Keralan backwaters.

Daddy's first attempt at face painting - a tigerrrrrrrr!