Then and now..

On the recent whirlwind India visit, my brother suggested we recreate an old photo.. I was not sure we were on the outside and parents were in the middle.. he was sure we were in the middle sitting on their laps..

Since the original was with me in the US, we could not verify.. 

Still, we present to you.. the four from 1976 (my sister was not born then!)

and now.. 

Next time we will try to get the order right and do one of those morphing GIF pictures.. 

Have a trove of pictures from the past which my brother had saved while moving houses. Given the short time, took iphone pics of those pics. Going to spend Christmas editing those photos and posting them on FB. 

We are going to have a "black and white" Christmas this year.

Two elephants, two hours, memories for two lifetimes

We did two trips within trips this year. The first one was a trip to Kerala with my parents, brother and sister and families. 

We stopped first at Thekkadi and went for an elephant ride to view the Western Ghat mountain range from vista points along a ridge. 

There were two elephants, one male and one female that took the family in batches of four through a 30 minute ride. The male elephant is apparently the fourth largest elephant officially known in Kerala. 

They were magnificent creatures and were happy to take the 4-5 kilograms of bananas divied up and distributed through everyone in our group. 

There were pictures.. lots of them.. here are a few.

Throughout the trip Jr. was a very serious person. The only time I saw her smile, even blush was when she was on the elephant! 

Then came the session where we fed the elephant and the kids got blessed by them. They were happy and scared to go near the giants but soon realized that the animals were gentle creatures. 

That was a kid who is scared and happy at the same time! Should caption that image "Scrappy"! 

Jr. did warm up to the elephant and fed it first. Did not expect her to be that bold. She surprised me.

and once she did it, was all proud. "Did you see what I just did?" 

The little one was really scared and needed a little help from the adults to go near the elephants. 

Then she was their "best friend"!

She got up close and personal !

There were many unforgetable moments on that trip. My parents who were not sure of joining us because of their health concerns, jumped in last minute to join us. Watching them go around on an elephant made my day! 

The views from the ride were breathtaking as well. You could see the mountain ranges, the towns and farmlands below and the sunlight doing a spotlight show through the break in the clouds. 

This reminded me of the views on the way back from Whittianga to Auckland in New Zealand. There is so much sightseeing to do in India. Don't know when we will get time to go soak it all in..

After this we went on a boat ride in the lake to spot wild animals and birds. That is a post for another day!