Peacocks and parrots

Here we are in Delhi. We arrived and moved into not a five star hotel or even a serviced apartment but a guest house. Highly reminiscent of our backpacker days, it was rather odd to be staying in a relatively low budget place (albeit with hot water and adjoining bathrooms) with two children, my mother and Jamie going off to work in the mornings. With no cooking facilities, we were on Indian take away for five nights with the children eating re-heated tinned spaghetti for the princely sum of £2 per tin. The spaghetti was starting to look rather appetising after five nights of palak paneer from the same restaurant.

The guesthouse is around the corner from our eventual house where renovations were and still are going on but this meant we could explore our neighbourhood. We are a couple of minutes from the beautiful Lodhi Gardens where the children can play among three hundered year old Moghul monuments while the weather keeps its cool. Two minutes away, I was relieved to find a delicatessen selling imported food at massive expense, a great bookshop - something so lacking in Shanghai - and a reliable butcher. Importantly, the Jorbagh Association also maintains tennis courts for members so Jamie and Eliot were impressed.

Eliot has started school and we have moved in to the house (more about that later). Toby has also started at a small nursery group and we are starting to feel our way around.

The boys are charmed so far. We live in a relatively tranquil area protected from the mayhem of the city. There are parrots and peacocks in the communal garden outside and on the way to Eliot's school, we pass the Delhi racecourse and polo ground where the horses are exercising. Weekend activity has been focused around visiting the National Train Museum, an outdoor graveyard for defunct steam engines - paradise for the boys.

Here are a few pictures to whet your appetite for more to come.