Okay! So there's NOT good news! I saw the Rev today and he thought it was a big joke, me working with the builders. In fact, I don't actually think he's got any idea what I could do, since he suggested that I go and learn mechanics at the CTUT1. So I'll do nothing, much - it suits me fine, really - and I can do music in the afternoons.
I learned today that the Rev doesn't know when his birthday is! His birth certificate says 3rd Jan '53, but his baptism certificate says 17th Jan '52! He was baptised on Easter day in '52 so he generally uses that birthday. It doesn't really matter anyway, because birthdays are another thing they don'e really celebrate over here. I told him about our eighteenth and twenty-first birthdays being milestones and how important they are to us. He was quite amused.
So it he was born in '52, that makes him 45 tomorrow. The poor chap hasn't had any children yet, which is pretty devastating for an Indian couple. In the Olden Days he would have got his mother to douse her in kerosene so he could find another wife before it's too late. In these enlightened times, however, he can but pray.
We also talked about houses; he's bought some land for his house for when he retires. He'd better not build it now though, it'll have fallen down by the time he's sixty-five! So he's got three houses. Pretty rich by our standards. We buy houses to live in, not to move between (generally). It's like their clothes: every time there's a festival they buy 'new dress'! we only really buy clothes when we need them.2 People seem to think that because they're poor, or less 'well-off' than us Westerners, they'll have less clothes, houses etc.
I went to do some music this afternoon and had a tone-deaf group of nine girls. I spent half an hour trying to get them to sing notes to 'la' after me. It didn't work very well and they couldn't distinguish between two different notes. I'll be glad of the choir tomorrow when those who can't sing will at least be drowned out! Some have got it and some haven't, but if they enjoy themselves, let them come!