Camila 19!

Today is Camila's 19th birthday. Last night (at 12:00am) the hotel staff gathered at the terrace of the 30th (top) floor of the hotel with champaign, a birthday cake (very nice chocolate!) and flowers. Overlooking Mumbai we sang Happy Birthday to Camila and she enjoyed it. For now, it is school ... And tonight we will look for some nice place to have a birthday dinner.

Happy Birtday Camila!

B-2-B

Back to Bradenton!
Melissa is not going to Mumbai. Nick Bollettieri's Tennis Academy offered her a place in the full time program and she wants to go for it. So, she will fly to Tampa again and join the high school at the IMG campus. We will miss her a lot, but also like this very much for her.
Go, Melly, go!

New friends

Camila met some new friends in the hotel in Mumbai:

Little girl is getting bigger

Yesterday we visited the Kanheri Caves deep inside the junglelike Sanjay Gandhi National Park. The caves, the statues, and the carvings are very old and beautiful in a sober way. When little girls get bigger they pay a lot of attention to their outfit, so the shoes Camila was wearing made a nice combination with the rest, but were less suitable for the slippery stairs to the caves ... So, we didin't complete the tour, a good reason to come back. After the caves we visited the Trimurti RS temple at the entrances of the park. The batteries of the photo camara went down, so we don't have pictures ... Another good reason to go back!

After our visit to the park, we drove to Manori, close to Mumbai, but a completely different world; very quiet, nice bungalows and small resorts at the beach. We lunched Butter Chicken and other delicacies at the resort Manoribel, their site has some nice pictures of the sea, beach, and surroundings. It was a pleasant and relaxed day (the city was very busy because of Independance Day), at night I left for Hong Kong.

Independence Day

Today we had great celebrations in our office in Mumbai; tomorrow is indepence day and all departments prepared a presentation of typical dresses, traditions and food of Indian states. Because of the event I dressed up in the clothes of Maharastra. As one of the judges (it was also a contest!) I had the opportunity to see it all very close and almost all departments took their chances to make me undergo some of the specific rituals of the state they presented. It was great fun and another possibility to look into the marvelous Indian cultures. Incredible India! It is very true.
PS - This picture was taken by Camila upon arrival in the hotel, she needed the whole day to recover from laughing when I dressed myself in the morning ...

First day in school

Yesterday was Camila's first day at school in Mumbai, she really looked forward to and enjoyed it very much. As the morning was the introduction program for students and parents, I joined. We both like the school and the people we met.

By the end of her first day, Camila was told that the school closes for a week; the government of the state Maharastra closed all schools and colleges because of Swineflu ... Such a set back after all the hurrying to be here in time for the first day! But hapily not everything came to a stop and today we spoke at school about her schedule and the subjects she will study this year.

Single journey to Victoria Station

Sorry for the long time it took to post a new blog entry!
We are very busy preparing our move to Mumbai. As per 1 September we will leave Hong Kong and start a new life in India! I will start working for IDBI Fortis Life Insurance, Fortis' joint venture with IDBI Bank and Federal Bank in India.

Camila will start school already next Wednesday 12 August, both Camila and Melissa will join the American School in Bombay. Melissa is still playing tennis in Florida, so she will start school beginning September.

Our new house will be in Malabar Hill, a nice spot called Petit Hall (the blob with the A on Google maps). It has a very nice garden, just at the sea!, a very tranquile spot!). Hope to post photos soon.

A few more weeks and we will join the many people that travel to Victoria Station with a single ... On our way for a new adventure!