Indus International School

Well, today was the big day. Our first trip to the kids' new school. We were a little nervous about making it to our appointment this morning because there is a taxi strike here! Thank goodness there are renegade drivers who are willing to ignore the strike and drive anyway! The roads were much less crowded with lots of the cabs off of them, but faster driving is actually much more scary! The driving in Bangalore will be an entirely separate blog. Suffice it to say, there are absolutely NO defensive drivers in all of the city.

We arrived safely at Indus and were greeted at the gates by a number of security personnel behind huge black iron gates.

At the reception desk, there is a big fish bowl, which the kids loved... then, while we waited for Jasmine to meet us, they served us fresh fruit juice in the lobby.

We met with Jasmine, the marketing manager for Indus. She is a lovely woman, who was born and raised in Bangalore. She gave us a brief overview of the school and then we went for a tour of the campus .

Some of the highlights... We found out that each student gets their own laptop! Taylor is wondering if she can play Webkinz in class.


Also, that their day involves lots of eating, which Andrew was very interested in. The entire schools gathers for breakfast each day at 8am... students and all staff eat breakfast together. Then at 10:15 am, they all gather out in the huge courtyard at the center of all the halls and have a cookie and juice break for 15 minutes. Lunch is served at intervals by grade around noon (no bag lunch allowed, everyone eats what is served!) and then at 3:15pm. the entire school gathers once again for sandwiches and drinks. We're talking about feeding 900+ students 3 times a day, WOW!! Here's a shot of the dining hall...

Another great thing is that the school supplies absolutely everything for the kids... they just need a backpack, swimsuit and a pair of sneakers. Also, they don't have "gym class"... instead, each student takes swimming (mandatory) and then chooses a sport, a hobby and an instrument. Then they are pulled from class at the time of their chosen interest. They can choose basketball, tennis, horseback riding etc...

We also found out that Lauren qualifies to attend the pre-k program there starting in December (they start them in school at 42 months of age!) She would ride the bus with Taylor and Andrew and have a full day there. She would love that. We can decide about that when the time comes.

The tour was great, and school starts on August 11th!

Next we were on to Commercial Street, where they had to get "measured" for their uniforms. Commercial Street in Bangalore reminds me of Chinatown in NYC. It is so crowded, you can barely walk. It is a crazy shopping mecca. Thankfully, our driver dropped us very close to the "alley" we needed to go down to get to "Neha Uniforms"...

It was an interesting business, really... people are just right there, some hand embroidering and sewing sequins by hand to the raw silks. Others sewing away at rows of machines. I cannot imagine how hot it must get in these buildings in the summer. Whew. This shot is of a guy (sitting)... applying sequin detailing to a beautiful white silk, while the other 2 men work at the sewing machine to make the sari.

We left Neha Uniforms and realized none of us had eat all day and it was 2:30 already! We hopped in the car and headed for lunch... A sight for sore eyes - (Bengaluru is the new name for Bangalore... it is actually the original name, from long ago, but is now back in style to say)

We headed in for genuine BURGERS! They import their beef from Australia and it is one great burger! The kids had milkshakes, potato skins and onion rings. The real McCoys. This Hard Rock Cafe just opened in January. It is a great place. Taylor wants to have her birthday party here in the spring. Why not?

We did not arrive back in Palm Meadows until about 5:00 and Pat had a conference call to take, so we headed out to the pool for a few hours.

2 of Taylor's new best buds are from California. Easy to remember their names... Taylor (7) and Lauren (9)... if that's not crazy enough, they are both Taylor Nicole! After swimming, Taylor grabbed her DS and the "Snakes" and Ladders game and headed to their room for dinner! Pat and Andrew headed out with the basketball to dribble down to the store and pick up some snacks for the room.

Another action packed day in India!