Then on Sunday we rested

Sunday May 21st

We are all set for Chemo for Monday morning.  The ECG, Blood tests and ECCO cardiograms are done, approved by the Cardiologist, Oncologist and our young resident doctors. Everything is calm and ready to go. Aman and Montu left on Sat. night. We all slept in on Sunday, Ritu texted to see if I wanted to see the street fair, Sonu picked me up in his new BMW and we walked around in the fair and a garden , had breakfast at Star Bucks ( Star Bucks here has delicious croissant sandwiches ( with some Indian masala)                               

                                                                            

Mangoes

Custard apple tree and a fancy building

.                                                  Pictures of the garden around Ritu's home. Mumbai is like a beautiful tropical paradise that did not happen due to the human population. The plants, the weather and the soil are perfect for lush green tropic and vegetation but ,instead, there are slums, rickshaws and garbage. 

Street Fair

Food truck at Street Fair

  Street Fair was no different than regular American Art and Wine festival or any other street fair.

   
  






 For lunch Kukki made his special chicken rolls. I have to admit, they were delicious. We watched the movie, "Dangal", a nice movie on real life story of Indian women wrestler ( sisters who were world champions for several years in a row) and what sort of discrimination they had to go through in Indian society. We walked on a very crowded beach and had a wonderful dinner when we came home..

This is the time of the years when the house maids go to their villages to take vacation.  With two out of three maids gone, the household changes a lot and it is interesting to see how the rich and poor become so interdependent. My little nephew's maid is gone and they are all having hard time managing him. ( He and I are bonding very well. :)

Generally, at least in Mumbai, most of the maids, drivers and servants are from "villages" . Their homes can be as far as villages in east India or as close as overnight trip to a village in the same state as Mumbai. Regardless of where they come from, their families are in villages. They have parents, siblings and/or spouses and children. They live in small "chhopat patti" ( slum homes) . They typically share a room with two or three other maids/ drivers and go home to the village only once a year or for some emergency. My brother's maids and drivers all live with in walking distance of their home ( behind the back gate) in a relatively nice looking low income area. ( i posted some pictures few weeks ago).