The Royal Regency, our hotel in Chennai.

Street scene in Chennai on our first day

Ray on our hotel balcony in Chennai

Looking down from our hotel balcony in Chennai

Across the street from our hotel in Chennai

Autorickshaws and sugar cane on the street in Chennai

Waste water behind our hotel in Chennai

Ruth, Ray, and Isaac on the train.

Amanda, Mary, and Isaac drinking coffee on the train. You can buy a cup from a vendor for about 4 rupees. It tastes like cappuccino.

Amanda blogging on the train between Chennai and Tenali.

Indian toilet on the train: if it's not dark, you can see the tracks speeding by through the open hole.

Our first meeting with the children.

At Tenali Train Station

Ray meeting Rajanikanth for the first time, at the station.

At Tenali Train Station

Welcome at Tenali Train Station

Ray shaking hands at the train station.

Lizard

Girls going to bed

More girls sleeping.

Rajanikanth and Kishore in Mary's kitchen

Our train left Chennai at 4pm. Our luggage was stuffed into the space with us, but somehow it all fit. Our seats easily turned into beds, and we slept during most of the seven+ hour trip.

They met us on the station platform around midnight. They chanted, "Welcome Mommy, Welcome Daddy!" and threw flower petals. It was realy overwhelming!

From right: Babblu, Nagaraju, Sambaiah, Solman, Bhima, Nagababu, Rambabu, Yesubabu.

From left: Sambaiah, Nagaraju, Babblu, Pavan, and Devaraj.

Front row, girls, from right: Buddu, Ramya, Rebakha, Chamondeswari, Shirisha, Sony, Srilakshmi, Sandyarani, Jansi, Durga, Tirapathamma, and Reetu.

Boys from right: Manova, Nagababu, Prabhakar. The other tall one is Ramesh.

The boys with bags of flower petals are Ch. Gopi (left) and Mahesh. The man in between them is Rajanikanth.

We were being told, "let's go," but Ray shook every hand first. These four girls, from left, are Ramya, Sandyarani, Srilakshmi, and Rebakha.

At Isaac's house, we noticed the occasional lizard high up in a corner of the ceiling.

The SH girls sleep at Isaac and Mary's house, on mats, lined up in their front room. They were giggly as Ruth photographed them. From left: Reetu, Durga, Chamondeswari, Srilakshmi, Bhavani, Rebakha, and Ramya.

From left: Bhavani, Rebahka, Ramya, Divya, Shirisha, Sandyarani, Sony, and Tirapathamma. (The other girls are on the other side of the room.)

We visited and had tea late that first night, and I think oatmeal, and then finally got to bed, although it was difficult to settle down after the excitement of finally arriving in Tenali.