a wonderful welcome . . . a world away!

After 36+ hours of travel, we arrived in southeastern India and received a wonderful welcome from the Children and Staff of the Orphanage.  Each of the 50 Children had a handful of orange flower petals to throw over us as we passed as well as flowers to place in our hands.  It was an overwhelming experience!  I wanted to stop and greet each child, but was hurried along to keep the welcome ceremony moving.

During our initial email correspondence, I included several pictures of myself at the request of the Staff.  They chose the picture below for the welcome banner and it confused the kids a bit . . . as they kept asking where my cap was in Telugu, their language, when we arrived?!  John Samuel, the Director of the Orphanage, commented that he was going to have to buy a cap for me to wear (as I didn't pack one) because the kids couldn't get over the fact that I didn't wear a cap at all times. 

Shortly after we arrived, breakfast was served - Rice and Bananas. 

The Boys lining up for food in their new "civil" uniforms.

We spent the rest of the morning getting to know each other - playing games, singing songs, and answering questions with the Children (with the Director serving as translator).  There were many many smiles all around.  All though they were very shy at first, they quickly warmed up to us and soon wouldn't leave our sides.  They were particularly interested in my camera and didn't understand the need to stand back, creating some distance, to be in a photo - many comical pictures resulted.