I'm Here!

Hi!!!

I am in India... and it's been a crazy first couple of days. I had two 8 hour flights and spent the night in the Mumbai airport with the five of the other students before finally getting on a domestic flight to our small town in the South. 

There were times when we were all so jet lagged that really anything seemed funny because we were all so out of it. I didn't realize how much jet lag would mess with me to get here. That aside, each day has progressively gotten better. 

Since being here I have learned about different aspects of Indian culture:

People drive on the left side of the road. As well as pass on the left. I experienced this first hand today when walking down some public stairs.

Indians have this way of “long blinking” where they see you and then blink for more than a second to acknowledge your presence.

I am very white and people stare at us constantly wherever we go.

After I woke up  I heard church bells ring this morning

If you think driving in D.C. is hectic please come to India. It is much worse. If there is simply no space on the sidewalk people just step into the street and then cars move into the other side of the lane…for a brief moment... where oncoming traffic may be coming and then get back into their lane. There are cross walks but no one will stop for a pedestrian without them asserting their presence.

Everyone walks here.

Indians have extreme tastes in their food. Either super sweet or spicy.  We have been drinking very sweet tea with milk and it is soo good. We have also been eating lots of fried treats as well.  On a different note, I had parrata today more of like sweet bread tortilla. (Mom and Dad it kinda tasted like the sweet Olga tortillas we used to get) I think this is my favorite Indian food I’ve encountered so far. 

We’ve been eating lunch with the other Indian students at school who eat with their hands. Sauces are poured over rice and then using all their fingers scooped up and put into their mouths… I don’t know how they do it. Afterwards we take our plates over to the spigots on the side of the building that all flow together in a sort of stream like water system. There we bang our plates in this big barrel to get rid of the food that was not eaten and then rinse and wash it using powdered soap.

Power goes out everywhere. In class today the Indian professor just kept on talking. She was perfectly un-phased where as I’m sure any other U.S. teacher would have a fit. It goes out in nice high end stores, as well as in our apartment. Thankfully, we have a generator for these cases.

I’m getting the hang of these bucket showers. I don’t really mind them.

They have wonderful colorful Saris here. We went shopping today and had such a hard time choosing. There were so many choices. (Mom you know how I am haha… thankfully they were very accommodating.) Some of the girls from our school came to give us pointers. One in particular named Merlin helped me.