This will be my last post.

I'm making this my last post because I'm leaving for the airport tomorrow at 8:oopm (Delhi time) for my 12:30am flight. That means it will be 2:00pm on Friday (America time) when I get on my plane to America. I hate being in airports but that's alright because I will be busy reveling in the fact that I just had an extremely amazing experience here in India.

I'm so glad that I decided to take this trip regardless of the nervousness I was feeling since the day I signed up. It's was really important for me to step out of my comfort zone at this point in my life and realize what is truly important to me. Those things include my family, friends, my well-being, knowledge base, learning by doing, understanding others, and cultural immersion. It is hard to know someone without getting as close as to the way they are living as possible.

I can say that I've come a long way in the last three weeks, with my predetermined notions about life in non-Western countries. I was right about some things but very wrong about others. That doesn't bother me either, I can say that I'm honestly very happy to have learned what I learned about myself and India.

I am also proud of myself for deciding to take this trip regardless of the barriers that were placed in front of me. This includes fundraising, planes, acts of violence in the country, being away from people I love, going somewhere alone, and knowing I was entering a country where English is not always spoken by the citizens.

But I did it, I can't wait to come home and put what I've learned to use. This has truly been a life changing and amazing experience. I thank everyone that followed the blog and supported me.

Lots of love.

Next trip: ........ graduation. hah.

Jaipur

I know you have been all wondering where my posts went so here I am! I'm sorry for the delay, I went away this weekend to Jaipur.

This weekend was really fun and informational as well as tiring and long. We woke up at around 4:00am to take a 6:00am train to Jaipur. I was really excited to go there because I heard lots of good things about the sights in the area.

Unfortunately, we missed the "kite festival" by a few days but we could see tons of kites hanging from trees and it must be a windy season because tons of kids were flying kites, something you don't ever see in Delhi.

When we finally arrived, we were approached by a rickshaw driver that said he would drive us around the city to sightsee for really cheap, adding up to about $2 each. We decided that was a good deal and agreed to it.

He drove us to our hostel (as seen above), which was gorgeous and we just relaxed there for a bit before getting picked up. He came and took us to a few of the sights and we were extremely amazed by them. First we stopped at the "pink city" which is painted all pink and took a few pictures. After that, we went to the outskirts of a palace that was open and then drove to what is called the "water palace". It's really just a palace that got flooded in the monsoon season and is now under some water. It looked really amazing. The picture at the top is me at my future home (the first mentioned palace and yes I am very excited lol)... After he got really weird and kept trying to take us shopping to places where he knew the owners, he was obviously getting a cut of the money or something.. we got frustrated and told him that we were done with him for the day and just walked around.

Later we went to a restaurant that revolved in a circle in the skyline so you can see the entire city, it was fun. We also got wine and had a drink while talking on the roof of the hostel and then called it a night because we had to wake up early the next day.

On Sunday we went to a place called Jantar Mantar (seen above). This is a place I would definitely recommend, it was just amazing. It is a bunch of astronomical instruments kept in one place that calculate things that have to do with the sun. I mean, I can't even explain many of them but the biggest sun dial in the world is there. Look at the link I posted.

After that we went to the City Palace. I decided that I will eventually move in there because with the little we saw, it just felt like home! In all seriousness, it was gorgeous and I learned a lot about India's past.

We were really tired but we went on a hunt to find the Minaret, which you can climb to the top of and see a 360 degree view of the city. GORGEOUS. The walk up there was very tiring but definitely worth it.

Then we went back to the hostel and relaxed in the sun until it was time for our train ride back!!!

And that... was my weekend!

I leave you with a beautiful view of Jaipur, I climbed a million stairs to get there so you better enjoy it!

Inauguration

I felt it was very important to make a post about the inauguration. I watched it in my flat last night and was extremely moved by our president's speech. This entire event has made me very proud of Americans for making the election of Barack Obama possible. I am so proud.

I just wanted to make the point that he is all over the newspapers in India and everyone is very excited for America and the future of our foreign affairs.

Temples

After work today we took a trip to two temples in the area. One was a Hindu temple (Chattarpur seen above) and it was very extravagant. It was built by a man who is considered a saint now and they had all of his things saved in a room where I wasn't allowed to take pictures.

We weren't allowed to go to the mosque today for safety reasons. Apparently there was a large crowd there for a holiday and the mosque is near a market so we steered clear. I wish we went though, we haven't been to many mosques.

Then we went to a Sikh temple (Gurudwara Rakab Ganj seen below) which was very simple but beautiful. They had people singing the prayers and playing music to them. It was pretty relaxing. This was my favorite temple because people were actually praying in it and it wasn't there so much for show. The hindu temple was very showy and a lot of people were there just to take pictures.

I've been thinking about what it is going to be like being home (in America) these past few days because time is ticking away and I have about a week left here. I'll be coming home on a flight on Saturday morning at 12:00am. I'm nervous to be in an airport here because it will be the weekend before a big holiday but obviously I have to be there. When I get home I will have one day at home (from about 7:00am) and then the Sunday after I have to drive back up to school that night. Then I start school the following day. I don't think I'm going to have time to go through any reverse culture shock because I just have to get back into the swing of things. The rush of readjustment will be very America.. fast pace, nothing waits for you.

I can tell I'm going to be upset when I find time to slow my life down, I imagine it will take about a week. I get upset thinking about it but I am listing the things I need to get done the first week of school in my head and it's just too much to even consider taking a breather. I can't wait to graduate!

Anyway, I'll stop talking about this because I need to live in the moment and enjoy my time while I'm here, this blog will probably be rewritten in a more emotion filled manner at a later date. lol

I'll end this blog with a picture of two children who were begging me to buy pens when we were stopped at a red light. I often stop and wonder about their terrible lives and how they are probably constantly in some state of melancholy. I blew a bubble at them for fun since I don't believe in supporting this type of child labor (they often never see the money from the things they sell, it goes to someone who is managing them). They stopped and laughed and were yelling about gum. They started making faces at me and I kept blowing bubbles at them in return. Then one kid flipped his eyelids at me and let me take a picture as you can see. I showed him the picture and he smiled and laughed with satisfaction. Then we said our goodbyes. This relieved some of the upset feelings I had about the mistreatment of children when I considered that they do have a rough and different childhood from me... but they find their ways of enjoying it. :)

Art and Lohri Festival

Working with the children is much easier. They are more receptive towards learning from us and we're getting the hang of teaching them. I'm sure the two go hand in hand.

On Monday, after work we ate lunch and decided to go to an art exhibit. It was really amazing, the funny thing is the artist is from Brooklyn named Rina Banerjee. Her art was selling for 1,000,000Rs ($20,000). I mean, it was really good but that's...... a lot of money. We hung out around the town the gallery was in and were stared at as usual lol.

Tuesday was just another day of work and I played with the younger children because they get to go outside and it's absolutely freezing inside. They seriously love me, they all yell "DEEDEE" and get my attention just to smile at me or show me something, so cute. These kids are so much easier to handle because they don't beat each other up as much and all you really have to do is make sure they don't get hurt. Definitely more my speed.

So when I went inside one of the girls who works there was playing with a baby and she I guess wanted me to play with the baby too. So she just hands this baby over to me, it definitely had some kind of birth defect but honestly, cutest kid EVER. I was playing with her and smiling at her because she smiled back. Then I pick her up to give her back to the girl that works there and...... she totally peed on me...

Yes. I went to India and I got peed on.

That being said, I went home and took a much needed nap. Then woke up just in time to for the celebration of Lohri. This is a celebration of the new crops that farmers will soon be harvesting. We made a bonfire type thing and threw popcorn, peanuts, and sugarcane into the fire. Then we danced around it haha very fun.

Hotels in India

Today was such a Sunday. I slept a lot and then Lindsay, Laiah, and I decided to be tourists at the AMAZING hotels in the area. (I'll add a picture another time). We took lots of pictures and I decided this would be a good hang out spot to find a prince considering the rooms start are about $250 a night for the bare minimum.

Considering this is potentially a very boring post... I'll talk about some of the amazing things about India, which can probably be generalized to many non-Western countries.

I love that people are always sitting outside talking to each other. There are always groups of people just enjoying each other's company on the side walks ALL DAY LONG. Everyone takes time in their day and appreciates those around them, it's a very beautiful thing. The human connection is very different here, people touch each other when they talk and speak very closely. There is no apologizing when you accidentally hit someone's foot under the chair. What are people saying sorry for anyway?

People say sorry a lot less here too, and thank you. Should I really be saying thank you for things that are basically common courtesy?

I just think some things make more sense here. I just really appreciate collectivist societies. I like that people just stop in at their neighbor's houses and have a drink and I really like that when one vendor needs change, he just asks the guy next door!

and so it becomes a list.

This is a list of perspectives that have changed for me since being in India. It will be ongoing until I leave! Non-critical, just observations.

1. STDs aren't so bad after all.

2. Seeing monkey's on the road REALLY isn't that big of a deal.

3. Squirrels, chipmunks, what's the difference?

4. When someone's driving on the wrong side of the road, it's unnecessary to honk.. but if you're passing someone honk away!

5. There is no need for a car seat when you can just plop your kid on the back of your motorcycle.

6. Men holding hands with one and other is far more appropriate than men and women holding hands.

7. Prayer stops are way more important than rest stops.

8. What's the point in going sightseeing when you can go American seeing and take pictures of the foreigners all day?

9. Keeping that in mind, it is perfectly normal to ask American women to take their picture, no matter who they are.

10. It really isn't a big deal to see people peeing all over the place in public, this includes children under the age of 10.

11. Indians will always pay less than Non-Indians, just don't question it.