And so it happened that C. could do whatever the fuck he wanted. I'm not going to get involved. This time I can't be faint-hearted. I must bury my feelings / opinions / ideas and let him get on with it. I'll just stay at home and cook shall I? No. I'm going to get hold of the hospital jeep and drive off into the outback while he's slaving over a hot classroom. Whatever I do I'll enjoy it and anything will benefit me because I'm in India! The Lonely Planet guide says that Tamil Nadu is the 'most Indian' part of India. It’s uninfluenced by the Aryan meat-eaters or the Muslim and Moghul invaders. It's Hindu architecture is at it's most vigorous (mud houses that fall down after ten years?) and even the British influence was a minor one. Not the impression we got, it has to be said. We need to visit more places.

We got quite a few invitations from the girls last night for the Pongal (harvest festival) celebrations. Apparently Christians don't celebrate it and it would be rubbish in Ramnad anyway. The festival is Monday to Thursday next week and Schwartz Matriculation have two days holiday. The other festival that starts next week is Ramadan – the Muslim festival of starving yourself for a month. One of the girls is going to explain it to us next week.

It's so frightening not knowing what you're going to be doing. I know I've said it over and over but everyone I want to talk to keeps being out and they're all working now. The Rameswaram bloke is never in so I can't talk to him. I wish I had some letters from home for comfort! I've been trying to find out if there's anything Ramnad 'needs' but there doesn't really appear to be. Not anything they'd continue with after I'd left apart from the choir. So I'm still looking...

We went to see '[imdb:Congo]' on Tuesday night, which was fairly exciting, even though we couldn't hear half of it! The Indians love adding their own sound-effects – something I'll probably become accustomed to then miss back in England!