23 Oct 2017 – 24 Oct 2017. After breakfast and before our treatments, the friendly ginger mama cat who’d been letting us pet her on our front steps tried to come right on in. Our collectors found us cuddling her on the porch. The man who walked me up to the treatment rooms told me that she had six tiny kittens in one of the treatment rooms, less than a week old! This, and she’s been coming to see us most days!

My therapist was Akshantha again (the same lovely woman who I mentioned in an earlier post). I was glad to see her again, especially because I wanted to thank her for her care before we left. But when we were finished with my massage, she asked what sort of treatment Thai massage would do for lower back pain. I described a few things, then once I was dressed, had her lie down. I worked on her for about 20 minutes until she said she really had to get ready for her next person. I was really happy to be able to extend some bodywork in her direction!

I had a last swim at the pool, chatting briefly with the only other white lady at IVAC and waving goodbye to the funny lady from Delhi and her husband. Then I showered and washed my hair three times trying to get all the excess oil out of it before our big travel.

We had a great driver back out of town town, and he even let us stop at McDonald’s to try the local veggie options. I had the McSpicy Paneer. Matt had the McMaharaja burger. Abbie and Derek had the same two options, although there were more local specialties as well.

Another long drive and finally we were in Bangalore, dropping by the housing development (“Oasis”) where Matt’s former colleagues Sarah Jane & Johnny live with their family. It was beautiful.

Sarah Jane made us cocktails which we enjoyed on their terrace, and then we left the kids with the maid and continued on to meet up with Johnny at a very swank brewery restaurant in town.

Our last Indian meal complete, at last we headed to the airport. Matt and I had access to the priority lounge, so I took a shower before our 10-hour flight to Paris. We slept most of the way, transferred in Paris, and were home with our kitties before noon. Altogether, a successful adventure. Thanks for reading!

Bonus supplements to come: trucks of India, and houses!