Fire in the Belly

Last night, most of the students had dinner with our host families.  My family is young: I have two host brothers who are 6 and 12 years.  They have promised to teach me cricket on the weekends and I get to watch them swim and play football.  Both were really excited to see me, particularly the younger one, who seems to have a nearly unquenchable amount of energy.  At dinner, he sang me a song in Marathi about an elephant, a lion, and an old man with a long beard and how they don’t want to get their photos taken.  My host father works in Mumbai and only is at home on the weekends, so I have not met him yet.  One of the grandmothers lives with the family (the other is one of the other host mothers) and enjoys watching Marathi soap operas.  My host mother went to an international school abroad, so she is very good at English, as is everyone else in the family.  She says she cooks food from all different countries as well and loves mashed potatoes, so I’m happy.  Our house is gorgeous, I have my own room, and the food is excellent.      

Look what we found...

Here are a few more tips for fellow travellers...

5) Having Malaria medication for your entire trip is a good idea.  Yes, it is incredibly expensive, but it will give you peace of mind more than anything.  I only have a couple of bites; we’ve barely seen any insects here in the city at all.  But we’re all talking about planning weekend trips now and, while I’m going to try to go anyway, I would feel a lot better about going if I was taking medication constantly.  Most of the students on my trip are taking Mefloquine and, just as a note, none of them have had nightmares yet and they’ve been taking it for a couple of weeks now.  And since that one is only the weekly one, it’s less expensive than Malerone.  Just keep that in mind.  Oh!  Another note: some of the people were able to get their insurance to cover it.  It’s difficult but definitely worth it if you can get them to do so.

7) For India in particular, temper the spicy food with food that isn’t.  Trust me, even if you think that you are prepared, you probably aren’t.  Even breakfast is spicy.  And while most of the people here may be physically smaller than us, but their appetites are most definitely not.  And it’s rude to leave food on your plate so, in the interest of good manners, you need to finish what you take or are given.  It’s almost physically tiring to eat so much hot food all at once.  Biscuits are a great idea.  Truly, the food makes you very thankful for the simple pleasures of culinary life: orange juice, chocolate, etc.  Trust me, there’s a reason that they drink so much tea: it isn’t spicy.  I’m coming to appreciate tea more and more.  (In fairness, there are people on this trip that claim that they haven’t had anything truly spicy yet and it’s well-known that I have almost zero tolerance for anything at all spicy.)

8) Insect repellent... don’t wear it when you will be inside for an extended period of time.  Even if the windows are always open, no insects come inside, particularly if the fans are on, which they usually are.  Put it on when you go outside and then it’s not so bad.  Although the bottles may say odourless, it will still smell, and DEET is, after all, toxic.  I put it on this morning before school and by lunch had a headache and was nauseous.  Hopefully, it didn’t make the people sitting on either side of me feel that way as well.  While I’m on the subject, lotion is better than spray.  It’s less greasy and doesn’t get all over everything.  Just be sure to not spread it too thickly.

That’s all the tips I have for now so onto other interesting things.  Instead of beeping, the trucks here all play songs when they reverse.  I have heard Silent Night (several times every day, actually), Here Comes the Bride, and Pomp and Circumstance so far, in addition to a few that I can’t identify.  I wonder if you get to choose that when you buy the car.

Power outlets need to be turned on before you use them here or else they don’t have any power.  I am only just now getting used to that.  The reason for that is that electricity is fairly expensive here so this cuts down on waste.  Also, it goes out sometimes (along with the water).  Apparently, this is not uncommon, although it has only happened to us a couple of times during the first day at the institute and hasn’t happened at all in the hotel).  Internet is a bit shaky everywhere though, even the hotel, and people don’t use it nearly as much as people in the West.

We have a French institute on the floors above us in our building.  One of the students there has been asked to show us around the city some so we have a guide of our own age.  He speaks six languages (Marathi, Hindi, English, Spanish, French, and Italian... and he speaks them well.  It makes us all feel uneducated.  He told us today that there is a Marathi version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory that was made here.  I think he’s going to lend it to us... that should be interesting; we’ll see how they compare to Johnny Depp, I guess (that was for you, Karissa).  Some of us have also gotten to know a guy who is doing construction on the bottom floor of our building.  He’s always smiling and helps us improve our limited Marathi.

Some of the students learning Marathi from one of our new friends.

We saw a water buffalo on the side of the road today just munching away at the grass.  Unfortunately, I didn’t get a photo of it and that sentence doesn’t really fit in anywhere else, so it’s here.  Well, that's long enough... or too long.  I shall write again soon.

*L*