This is one of my favorite India photos, mostly because there were hordes of Indian school children on field trips in many of the places we visited AND they seemed to just love us.
This picture was taken in Kanyakumari, at the very tip of the Indian peninsula. It is where the waters of the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal, and the Arabian Sea all meet. We ferried over a pair of small islands, one with a giant statue of the Indian poet-saint Thiruvalluvar. On our ferry were these wonderful young schoolgirls, in their blue gingham blouses and navy blue skirts. They waved at us and wanted to shake our hands. This was not the first time this had happened to us. We must have seemed to be very exotic; there were almost no other Caucasians around for most of our trip.
The girls were beautiful and friendly. When we finally got back to the mainland, the entire group called out a loud "good-bye" to us as we disembarked from our ferry.
Here are the schoolgirls that mobbed me in Mysore, further north. We were visiting a temple and these girls all wanted to shake my hand and know my name. They were really happy when John suggested I take a photo with them.
All the people we met in India were so nice to us and interested in us. Some of the time, it was hard to understand their English (their accents gave us trouble) but it was always worth the effort.
What a wonderful adventure! The people in Senegal were very interested in me when I visited too. I guess we are novelties. :)
Posted by: Margaret | Thursday, March 22, 2012 at 06:24 PM