As one of the only foreigners in Vizag, it's hard to go anywhere without getting strange looks and reactions. At the crafts fair the other day, a woman about my age approached us and wanted to take her picture with us. Another woman at the market asked 'what country?' but didn't understand when I answered United States and asked a second time, after which she just stared at me quizzically. We were in the elevator the other day with two Russians who made a triangle symbol above their heads and said Moscow and then pointed at us, also wanting to know where we were from. At the vegetable market today, a woman at one of the booths grabbed my arm and said that despite being a tourist, I looked very proper. She described Viru as a devil with her hair all loose. This was on our way home from work, both still in scrubs covered in cow poo. I apparently was described as proper simply because my hair was tied back, which is the appropriate and traditional way for Indian women to wear their hair. When I got back to the hotel and found that it was all over the place from a long day working in the sun, I was very surprised that I got this reaction from her! We also met a veterinarian who works at the government vet hospital at the market - he saw that we were wearing our scrubs with vet school logos on them and stopped to talk to us; we may go shadow him for a day at his clinic.
We went to a few beaches and parks overlooking the water yesterday after work. Gorgeous views with the water and the hills in the distance contrasting with garbage all over the shore. A woman who sold us corn roasted in coals and coated in lemon juice (and chili powder for most) told us that the trash was cleaned up daily and was all from what people dropped there. But used tubes of toothpaste, wrappers from instant noodles, much of the trash wasn't exactly what one would think people would toss when walking along the beach, so we think a lot of it probably washed up from elsewhere. There were street dogs running about playing on the beach, most well-fed and most already spayed/neutered. Lots of rocks to climb on, and tons of people wandering about everywhere, many of them staring after us as we passed.
We are getting into a routine with our work at the shelter. When we drive up, we get greeted by a few dogs who hang out outside the gate, our favorites being TanTan and Mangey-Face. We start off with rounds in the cat wards. Start with the social ward where many of the cats are very happy to see us. It was sunny this morning so they were all lying outside much of the day (their enclosure has indoor and outdoor sections to it), but all came meowing to meet us at the door. We've named some of them with not-so-creative names based on their looks or behavior, but it's impossible to keep track of them all. Scrapper, Little Scrapper, Ms. Mustache, Tripper, Lemur, Leo... After checking how everyone is doing and treating some of the kitties (a few suspect kidney failure cats in the last couple days, and some URI cats last week who are doing better), then it's off to the less social wards. Rubber and Orange Guy are happy to see us in one of the wards, but all of the others there are absolutely terrified and hide in their little boxes, darting away when we approach - especially Scaredy, whose eyes always seem to be hugely dilated. There's a room dominated by torties and calicos, and there's only one cat in that room who I've been able to touch, but she's definitely starting to warm up to me. Upstairs is the orange cat room, where they weren't so sure about us at first but now we have lots of friends there. It's funny how much the colors here correlate to behavior. Almost all of the black and whites who are brave enough to approach us love to lick our shoes. None of the black cats will get anywhere near us, though that's more understandable based on how they are treated out in the world. Most of the calicos and torties are also terribly afraid, and most of the orange cats are fairly social and like to rub against us.
After the cats, it's on to working with the dogs, either helping with surgery prep or the new project that we've started up, which is examining and treating the shelter dogs. Many of the dogs are really fearful and certainly not leash-trained, so it's a very different experience to handle them than dogs in the US and we have one of the shelter staff helping us. After lunch, it's on to the calves. There are about fifty of them in the sick area, though many of them are getting a lot better. We get an assembly line of sorts going to treat their eyes and feet, giving injections of various drugs as needed. I had never really worked with cows before this trip, but I'm getting pretty comfortable with how to handle them and love all the babies here; they are much cuter than calves in the US. We also hang out with the monkeys and feed them bananas (which the cows also love), though some of the monkeys grab the bananas quite rudely from our hands and get really angry when we don't offer them more.
We went to a few beaches and parks overlooking the water yesterday after work. Gorgeous views with the water and the hills in the distance contrasting with garbage all over the shore. A woman who sold us corn roasted in coals and coated in lemon juice (and chili powder for most) told us that the trash was cleaned up daily and was all from what people dropped there. But used tubes of toothpaste, wrappers from instant noodles, much of the trash wasn't exactly what one would think people would toss when walking along the beach, so we think a lot of it probably washed up from elsewhere. There were street dogs running about playing on the beach, most well-fed and most already spayed/neutered. Lots of rocks to climb on, and tons of people wandering about everywhere, many of them staring after us as we passed.
We are getting into a routine with our work at the shelter. When we drive up, we get greeted by a few dogs who hang out outside the gate, our favorites being TanTan and Mangey-Face. We start off with rounds in the cat wards. Start with the social ward where many of the cats are very happy to see us. It was sunny this morning so they were all lying outside much of the day (their enclosure has indoor and outdoor sections to it), but all came meowing to meet us at the door. We've named some of them with not-so-creative names based on their looks or behavior, but it's impossible to keep track of them all. Scrapper, Little Scrapper, Ms. Mustache, Tripper, Lemur, Leo... After checking how everyone is doing and treating some of the kitties (a few suspect kidney failure cats in the last couple days, and some URI cats last week who are doing better), then it's off to the less social wards. Rubber and Orange Guy are happy to see us in one of the wards, but all of the others there are absolutely terrified and hide in their little boxes, darting away when we approach - especially Scaredy, whose eyes always seem to be hugely dilated. There's a room dominated by torties and calicos, and there's only one cat in that room who I've been able to touch, but she's definitely starting to warm up to me. Upstairs is the orange cat room, where they weren't so sure about us at first but now we have lots of friends there. It's funny how much the colors here correlate to behavior. Almost all of the black and whites who are brave enough to approach us love to lick our shoes. None of the black cats will get anywhere near us, though that's more understandable based on how they are treated out in the world. Most of the calicos and torties are also terribly afraid, and most of the orange cats are fairly social and like to rub against us.
After the cats, it's on to working with the dogs, either helping with surgery prep or the new project that we've started up, which is examining and treating the shelter dogs. Many of the dogs are really fearful and certainly not leash-trained, so it's a very different experience to handle them than dogs in the US and we have one of the shelter staff helping us. After lunch, it's on to the calves. There are about fifty of them in the sick area, though many of them are getting a lot better. We get an assembly line of sorts going to treat their eyes and feet, giving injections of various drugs as needed. I had never really worked with cows before this trip, but I'm getting pretty comfortable with how to handle them and love all the babies here; they are much cuter than calves in the US. We also hang out with the monkeys and feed them bananas (which the cows also love), though some of the monkeys grab the bananas quite rudely from our hands and get really angry when we don't offer them more.
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