Happy 2007!

We just returned from a wonderful though busy three weeks in Europe...Christmas we spent with our family and for New Years Eve we went to Switzerland to enjoy a week of snow, fresh air, mountainview and "Gipfeli" (croissants...but since our good friend Michael explained what they are made of, I think I just ate my last...).
Obviously the wonderful Christmas dinners took their toll when we tried to squeeze into our ski pants - mine kept popping open whenever I exhaled - so yes, we WILL start dieting now! No more of Bishnu's wonderful chappatti's and curries... salad it is! (Which incidentally happens to grow in our vegetable garden; nothing beats freshly picked salad, so I am hopeful the dieting will not be too much of an ordeal!).

Returning home was a better experience than last time...Bishnu and Jubeda had methiculously cleaned the whole house, put flowers everywhere (EVERYWHERE...every vase I own was used) and turned the heaters on in the living room and the bedroom. Also, no extra people living at the farm, no bills for stuff that was bought (and that I was expected to pay for), and they even took Olly Kumar to the vet when he was ill. So far so good.

Currently it is very cold in Delhi; during the day we have a wonderful 18 degrees celcius, but the nights are freezing cold with a moist and foggy 2-3 degrees. Houses generally do not have a heating system so we can barely manage to reach 14-15 degrees inside when turning on the airco's. T remembers similar conditions from when he was a child...I on the other hand have childhood memories of tropical temperatures so today I will go to Khan market and buy radiators so we can keep at least one room at a comfortable temperature!

Next week our first guests will arrive, Hilde and Ingo + 3 kids, whom we met in Korea. They are being posted back to Germany and decided to hold a stopover of a week in Delhi. As Murphy's law dictates, now is the moment for things to start breaking down...in this case the bathrooms. At the moment, three of the four showers are not working and the fourth barely has enough hot water for one adult...and four out of the five toilets we have will not flush down toilet paper as the sewage system was not installed properly...if this continues, we'll have to take a bath in the (freezing cold!) swimming pool and find some bushes to do the rest in.
Or we could all cuddle up, simply skip washing and do justice to the dutch saying "waar het stinkt is het warm" (where it is smelly it is warm)... It will be a memorable stay for them, that's for sure! I'll ask them to write a blog about their experiences!

For now, we both wish you a happy, healthy, exciting and warm 2007! We'll keep you posted about our exciting life in New Delhi!