Becky's last days

That title kind of makes it sound like Becky's dying. She's not. She just went back to America.

We had a fun couple of days. I took the day off from school for her last two days so that I could work on some essays and take her around Dehradun to run errands.

Monday night, we went up for a sleepover with Achui and Achan. They made us a fabulous dinner and then we played games and worked on some crafts.

Becky and Achan very nicely helped me to finish baby Elliot's stocking so that Becky could take it back with her to the states. I'll be back before Christmas, but it will be nice for Kimie to be able to hang up Elliot's stocking next to his baby sister.

In class, I was explaining in Hindi that my sister was going to have a little boy. My teacher tried to correct me because he said that I didn't know the sex of the baby. He was quite surprised to learn that sonograms are legal in the US and many many couples find out the sex of their baby before it's born.

In India, they have a problem with female infanticide so they don't allow people to get sonograms because they might abort the baby if it's a girl.

That's so horrifying to me, I can't even begin to imagine. 

But I digress.

On Tuesday, we made one last stop at Becky's (and my) favorite Samosa place. It's right next door to the hostel and they do make very good Samosas. That's basically a bit of seasoned potato wrapped in pie crust and deep fried. It's pretty good.

Becky made friends with the wife.

After that, we headed off on the beast for Rishikesh.

And we were about two thirds of the way there when the Beast got a flat tire. 

I've had a few flat tires in my day. But the thing about living in the south (and maybe other places in the US as well) is that I've never had to change a tire. I actually do know how. and I've done it as practice. But when I've had a flat tire on the road, someone's always stopped to help.

Fortunately for us, this time was no exception.

I had about half of the lug nuts off when two very nice young men stopped to help.

They got the tire changed, and then they led us to a repair shop where my tire was fixed! 

We tried to give them money, but they wouldn't take it. We didn't even get their names! But they live in the town of Wiki. That's what it sounded like anyway.

After that, we made it to Rishikesh so that Becky could see the River Ganges.

This is Becky pulling burrs out of her foot because I kind of ran her into a thorny bush when a bus almost ran us off the road. Sorry Becky!

We spent a couple of hours walking along the river and exploring the touristy shops.

Of course there were monkeys.

Then we headed back to Dehradun.

In the dark.

And the cold.

And I managed to miss a turn somewhere in there so we ended up on the Northern route which takes longer. However, apparently, the Northern route lacks elephants so maybe it was the hand of God keeping us safe.

People here keep trying to convince me that there are wild elephants on the way to Rishikesh. That they are very very dangerous and that they pull people out of their cars and then stomp on them.

This REALLY seems like an urban legend to me. The kind of thing that happened one time with one crazy elephant, and now is a common occurrence in people's minds. It just seems so unlikely to me that an elephant would attack people if it were completely unprovoked.

In anycase, we didn't get any first hand knowledge of this particular story which is probably a good thing.

Becky headed out a few hours after we got back and I was proud of myself for not crying when I saw her off at the train station.

It was really nice to have her and I'm so thankful for our time together.

I'll be back in Dallas on December 17th. It's hard to believe that the time has gone by so quickly. That's less than three weeks away! I am looking forward to seeing all of my friends and family very soon.