The Not So Elusive Canis Via

"Snickers," the alpha male Canis Via of Northeast Golf Links

In less than one week, Karen, her father and I will be stalking jackals, leopards, tigers, sambhar, and gazelles while on safari in Ranthambore National Park.  Five weeks after that, I will be doing the same with my parents in Jim Corbett National Park.  Being the prepared photographer, I decided to develop and polish my wildlife photography skills by going on safari in Golf Links, my neighborhood.  Over the past few weeks, I've been photographing the non-elusive Canis Via.  Otherwise known as street dog, the Canis Via roam in abundance throughout the numerous parks, sidewalks, alleyways, and trash piles of Golf Links.  Below are some photographs I've taken while on safari.

This Mom and her pup lived in the park in front of our apartment for a couple weeks.  I have not seen them for about a week.

This looks like the Mom is about to kill her pup, but they were just play fighting one Saturday afternoon in the park.

This time the Pup was in control of the fight!

I would not like to get on her bad side!

These dogs are awesome!

After 10 minutes of play fighting, Mom needed her moment to Zen.  She takes a deep breath while her son eats a leaf.  I've seen this look on my Mom's face before!!!

The little guy decides to go off and play while Mom relaxes.

He enjoyed stalking me from the bushes.  He'd keep his eye on me and charge at me!  I had tiny wet paw prints all over my jacket!

Snickers, the only dog we've named, lives on the corner sidewalk in front of our apartment.  This dog is the Tony Soprano of street dogs.  He doesn't take crap from anyone,  doesn't move out of the way for anything, leads a pack of dogs, walks with a small limp on cold days, has crazy patches of hair from past fights, barks at speeding taxis, and always, always walks with his tail raised high.  What a tail!

Snickers showing his sweet side one Sunday morning.

This guys lives a few parks down from our park in Golf Links.  Here he lays in the middle of the street during sunset one day in November.

This guy lives by the park across the street in North East Golf Links.   Here, he heard a friend barking and came running through this hole in a brick wall.  Some street dogs have collars?

These two took a while to warm up to the camera.  When I walked into their park, they immediately stopped playing and came over to see who I was and what I was doing.

After a couple of minutes, they lost interest in me and started playing again.  I think this might be another Mother and son.

This guy perked his ears up when I walked by

This big rascal lives in southeast Golf Links.  The guards provide him with a winter jacket.  He walks like a walrus and is so sweet!

I was in awe when I saw this dog in center Golf Links.  I've never seen a dog with such cool eyes!

Snickers hanging out with the pup and his best friend in the doggy sweater.  Snickers' friend is really old and walks very gingerly.  He has a very low, coarse bark.   The two of them like to sleep next to each other on the sunny patches of the sidewalk.

There are many people who like to sit and eat in the parks around Golf Links.  This guy is eating some Roti that was thrown his way.  The street dogs are taken care of for the most part.  There are bowls around the neighborhood that people fill with water and food.

The small print on the sign says "friends of all security guards of Golf Links."  I think this is because the guards sleep at night.  If there is any suspicious activity around the neighborhood, the dogs bark and wake them up!

This guy doesn't live in our neighborhood, but we see him every time we walk to Khan Market.  He is resting in the median one busy afternoon.  One night in December, he was nestled in a pile of warm trash.  This dog is very sweet.  Many dogs become street dogs when their foreign owners abandon them.  According to this article in The Telegraph, Brits are the biggest culprits mainly because of their laws.

This little guy was outside of our hotel in Kasauli.

Smile, Look to the sky, Shake your head, and Say "C'mon Man!?"

Smile, Look to the sky, Shake your head, and Say "C'mon Man!?"

Saturday, January 22 - Today was another interesting day for Karen and I.  It was one of those days where we find ourselves shaking our heads and smiling a little more than usual.  Kind of like this past Tuesday when I was walking around Connaught Place and someone skillfully squirted dog shizzle on my shoe without my notice just so his cohort, the shoe shine man standing 20 yards ahead, could notice it with surprise and ask to clean it for 100 rupees.  But that's another story!

Today, we left the comfort of our apartment and dived into "Incredible India" at 2pm.  The first task was to walk to the taxi stand.  Along the way, we noticed a large birthday party set up in a park.  The party was for "Ratin" who was probably 6 or 7 years old based on the attendees.  Her name was spelled out with 5 large Mylar balloons that floated above the entrance.  Inside, there was a bouncy castle, a Thomas the Tank riding train, gangsta rap playing on the stereo, tons of balloons, and 8 round tables for the kids to eat their cake on later.  Yes, sweet Ratin and all the precious little children in the red inflatable castle were bouncing to the beats of gangsta rap.  I couldn't recognize the song, but it was so gangsta that I think I saw Thomas the Tank loose a little steam and frown when the aforementioned rapper called someone a "snitch n-word."  I just smiled, looked to the sky, shook my head, and said to myself "C'mon Man!?" According to babynames.com, Ratin means love & happiness.

The destination of our Taxi was to a delayed New Year's party at a friend's apartment in Vasant Vihar - about a half hour from our home.  The party was as wonderful as it's hosts!  We ate skillfully prepared black eyed peas, corn bread, and collard greens meant to bring everyone good luck and a lot of money.  You Southerners know what I'm writing about.  Karen got 3 coins in her black eyed peas!  We spent 2+ hours at the party and then made our way to Ambiance Mall.  This 5 story mall is one of three very large shopping malls built next to each other in Vasant Kunj Phase II, a barren wasteland located near the airport.  The very site of these 3 ultra modern mega malls rising from rubble strewn desolation makes me shake my head and smile.  India - a land of contrasts.  We did a little shopping and went to Chilli's to eat nacho's and fajitas.  Below is a video and some funny pictures taken from inside the mall.

Escalators are still fairly new to India.  There is a learning curve on how to ride one.  Observe.

101 BRATS - Does the owner of this childrens' clothing store like kids?

Not only is The Body Shop 100% Vegetarian, but they play 2 Pac inside. The song "Ghetto Gospel" was playing!

Karen throwin' up signs and straight grillin' in front of Westside Clothing.

The cafe where you pour your own beer!  There is an electronic leader board inside displaying the names of the big drinkers!

A little more info

What is going on here??  Are they are hiding the statue of David on the left?

Chili's Indian Menu - No Lamb in our Skillet Queso please!

A view of Ambiance Mall from the top level.  A nice place to come and escape reality!

I had to put this one again.  I'd like to meet the person who came up with this sign!

The Upholsterers

The past three days I've had the pleasure of sharing our living room/dining room with two Indian upholsterers.  They arrived each day at 10am and worked until 4pm with a half hour lunch break in between.  The younger of the two spoke very limited English while the older one was like me....didn't even attempt to speak the other person's language.  Well, I did try to say "Pani", which means water, but I think I butchered it so I fell back to English and said "water" or "wuter," which they understood and partook.

After they set up shop and began working in our living/dining room, the place seemed split in two.  I worked in the dining area with my fairly new Macbook Pro while they worked in the living room area with their century old hand-crank sewing machine.   I felt a bit awkward, so I decided to make the situation even more awkward for the three of us.  After a short internal debate, I got up the nerve to ask if I could take pictures of them with my imposingly large camera.  Their response was one that I've grown to know well over the past few months.  It was the classic long blink with simultaneous head bobble...aka wobble, wiggle, or nod.  Expats in India have learned that this can mean yes, no, or maybe.  I felt optimistic, so I chose it to mean "yes."  I could tell they didn't know what to do once I put the camera to my eye, so I just smiled, did a little head bobble of my own and said "Ok."  Immediately, they seemed at ease and went back to work while I crawled around on the floor and took pictures of them from various cramped angles.  I know they thought I was crazy.  I figure they now have a good story to tell their friends and family!  Ten minutes later, to my delight, the younger guy came over to my laptop to take a look at the pictures I just downloaded.  Surprisingly he asked if I had a jump drive!  I told him I will make him a CD as he smiled at the laptop screen displaying their pictures.

Another highlight was watching cricket with them as we all worked.  I am still clueless when it comes to cricket, but it was fun seeing and hearing their passion for the game.  There were mostly sighs however, as India apparently didn't do well against South Africa.

Three days, two couches, two chairs and 4 dining chairs later, they were finished.  The bill was a whopping $77.  Their work was flawless!  We wrote them thank you cards and gave them a tip.  If you are wondering why the guy below has on a puffy jacket and matching hat, our apartment is cold and he's got style!  We have a space heater, but unless you are 3 inches from it, it's still cold.  Since Delhi is cold for only 2 months of the year, most homes are not equipped with heating.

Talented Fella!

During the first day

 

The final product

A taste of North Carolina in Bangkok

From Winston Salem to Bangkok

Karen and I were walking towards Siam Mall in Bangkok last week and noticed a line of people waiting to go inside.  It was 95° and humid, so I knew there had to be something important inside.  I walked in expecting to see a Thai version of Justin Bieber signing posters and flashing peace signs at flashing cameras.  It turned out to be WAY better than that!  Walking past the queue moments ago, I knew I recognized the look on everyone's face!  They needed the Kreme....Krispy Kreme!  We were proud North Carolinians on this day!  Check out the video below.

 

Some other shots from the mall!

Karen's favorite spot in any mall!!!  We shared a cinnamon and a regular buttery pretzel.  They were made to order too!

No, we didn't eat here, but we had to Namaste with Ronald McD!  We ended up eating some Tom Yum (spicy soup) and other goodies in the mall's awesome food court!

Happy New Year 2011!!

NYE in Bangkok Airport, Thailand

New Year's Eve 2011 and we were in the Bangkok airport waiting for our return flight to Delhi.  After arriving back "home" just before midnight, we successfully used the pre-paid taxi service and were greeted at our gate by our landlord and a few of his friends who invited us in for wine and dinner (of course we didn't eat until almost 1:00 a.m.).

2010 was a BIG year for us... it taught us a lot about patience, persistence, family, and hope.  It brought us a lot of changes with our move to India - and we survived!!  No resolutions for 2011, just hoping this year will bring even more adventures (in a good way).  Wishing you the best for 2011!!

Merry Christmas from Thailand!!

Merry Christmas 2010 from Koh Samui, Thailand

Christmas Day at the Beach Republic Resort, Koh Samui

We are having a blue Christmas in many ways... first and most importantly, we are away from our family and friends that make the Christmas season such a cherished one.  Also, we are in Thailand surrounded by turquoise blue water and skies.

We send our love and wishes of peace & joy for a wonderful Christmas holiday!

Old Delhi Outing

Old Delhi at dusk

We first ventured into Old Delhi on a Sunday afternoon by ourselves and decided that the next time we went, we needed a guide.  A coworker of mine organized a field trip to Old Delhi to visit a school-supply store.  A cab and metro ride later, we walked out onto the crowded street.  Wires criss-crossed over our heads.  Cramped stalls and vendors lined the streets.  "This is the India I had imagined," we both said to ourselves.  It was dizzying and intriguing all at once.  Here are a few snapshots and photos.

First cycle rickshaw ride

Streets of Old Delhi

School-supply store

Walking the streets of Old Delhi

Girl