Other than the spider work I tried to learn Tamil from Selvan but he was keen to learn English from me and so both of us failed in learning a new language and ended up speaking a cocktail of TamEnglish instead. Extracts from Diary: Spiders 26th November: Uncle Mano and I left for Dr Vijayalakshmi's office this morning at 7 a.m. While Uncle Mano and Madam chatted, I read some books. Madam then showed us her spider collection. She also introduced me to Selvan. Before we left she gave me some books to take home to read. 27th November: Watched how Selvan separated baby spiders from their mother, placing each baby in a separate container. There were about 110 babies. Then we fed about 200 older spider babies. Selvan showed me how to check their moulting. 28th November: Today I did feeding of the spider babies on my own. Then transferred adults from one container to another and then fed them. 29th November: Today did only feeding of spider babies. Madam did not come to the office as she was ill but her husband Dr Balasubramanian came to check on us instead. Read some books on spiders in the afternoon. Left early for home as Uncle Mano and Aunty Sagu were going away for a few days and I would be staying at their relative Santosh Kumar's place instead. They left at 7.30 p.m. and I waited at their neighbour's place for Santosh to collect me which he did at 9 p.m. 30th November: Being Sunday I got up late and ate idlis, dosas and sambar for breakfast. Wrote out my diary for the past 2 days and watched some TV. In the evening Santosh took me to the bus stand and explained the route I would have to take next morning to CIKS. 1st December: Madam came to the office today and showed me how to collect spiders which were in the compound of the office. She also gave me some more material to read on spiders and told me to start preparing my essay on spiders. After doing a little bit of feeding as usual, I went out on my own and collected few species of spiders. Then Madam helped me identify them and also some other species of spiders that they had caught. Spent the afternoon catching flies to feed to some of the older spiders. 2nd December: Today I only did identifying of different species of spiders. I took some material home to read and so I left early; was so busy looking at the books I was carrying, I didn't notice the terminus where I was to get off and got over carried much further. Had to walk nearly half an hour back. Asked people for directions and finally reached the terminus. 3rd December: Did not feel well today so I didn't go to CIKS. Read the books I had brought at home. Started preparing my written report. 4th December: Today did feeding of spiders as usual. Then caught about 70 flies and fed them to the adult spiders. Put 2 spiders to mate and made my observations. Continued writing my report in the evening. 5th December: Went to New College to collect my vermiculture report.