Take away Tirunelveli style.

Sometimes my lack of Tamil creates hilarious situations!
The place I am staying is a residential facility for elderly women with hearing impairments. There is a bakery on the premises too, staffed by a mix of hearing impaired people and others.

At around 6pm last night I turned on the tap in my room and there was no water - this is not unusual, but this time the pastor and the office staff were not around.
There are three types of water here - bottled water, drinking water - which is not really drunk any longer as although filtered, it is just slightly purer than the third type, bore well water which is slightly salty, apparently. Bore water is always available the other water is distributed differently. Most people have an enormous tank, usually on the roof. The tank water is the better water and is what comes out of household taps for general use.
Periodically the tank gets too low and when that happens, no water comes out of the tap. That is what had happened.
The solution is to turn on the electric pump which draws the water and fills the tank up again. My problem was how to explain all that to my fellow residents - and the shop staff who have no English. I did well though, after lots of giggles and variations on Makaton and what I can only describe as charades, I got the message across and the pump was turned on. My next concern was who would in the local parlance 'off the switch'. More miming, pointing at clocks, switch and tank and we got there. I was relieved of responsibility.
By then there were about 10 of us, signing, giggling and trying in as many ways as possible to communicate but we got there. The Tamil for water btw is Tanir, I do know that, but when I said that, the shop keeper rushed off and brought a bottle of mineral water to me! Oops!
I had a lovely evening last night with Carrie and her son, he is definitely taller than me! We talked for hours, reminiscing, we have a lot of shared history.
My blip today is my takeaway lunch which came complete with a rolled up banana leaf to use as a plate!