..SouthAsiaRocks..

Last night we went to the most amazing wedding ever!!! The groom in this wedding was in our friend Rahul's family. We were expecting a nice wedding, but when we got there we were amazed!! The pic below shows the entry way. This entry way was super long! It took us about 5 minutes of walking to get from the entrance to the wedding area! The orange and red you see are strings of flowers!!! There were millions of flowers hanging up everywhere! When you first walked in there was a huge open room. It was sectioned off into areas with couches and tables. There were fancy fires on stands everywhere to keep you warm. There were all sorts of snacks and drinks available. There was a Costa Coffee stand, a Juice Bar, Soup & Bread Bar and waiters walking all around serving snacks! The Brides' family is the one that was throwing this wedding. Their family owns a very famous Paan company here and their business is a multi-million dollar business. There was a paan bar set up ...

OK, so I want to know what you guys want :) WHat kind of things do you want me to blog about? Any cultural questions? - Sharon wanted to know about the dots (or Bindis/tikkas) that people wear on their foreheads... do you guys have any other cultural questions that I should blog about? Any pictures that you want to see? - Here's a pic Annie wanted me to post :)... So comment and let me know what you want to see :)

Our good friend Rahul came by the Capital!!! Him and his wife are really good friends of ours from College (Go FSU!) and Sem (New Orleans whoo hoo!)... He was on his way to a wedding in the Eastern part of our country and stopped through the Capital for a night :) Here's a pic of him holding Aashini for the first time at his relative's house. Here's a pic of his little cousin and his Aaya (nanny). He was a cutie! This is Rahul's Auntie :) She was really nice. We love you Rahul!!! It was awesome getting to see you!!!!! Whoo hoo!!!

So, many of you have asked what a typical day is like for us.... well.... I can't really answer that question, because there aren't any "typical" days.... everyday is different and tends to have many unexpected surprises... Today was one of those days.... Our friend Deepak comes over once a week to learn stories... (It's usually a different day each week - again, no typical days or weeks).... Deepak always comes over. Sometimes his wife and son come, and sometimes Kamla (family friend) comes.... well, today it was Deepak, Sunita (his wife), Daniel (Deepak & Sunita's son) Kamla, Kamla's Daughter (Mona), Mona's baby, and then two other kids that were somehow related to Kamla... So.... in case you have lost count, that's 4 adults, 3 toddlers/preschoolers, one infant, plus Me, Adam & Aashini. Oh -- and the 4 adults & 4 kids all came in ONE rickshaw! (and Sunita is 8 months pregnant!). (Here's a pic of a rickshaw below in case you forgo...

So I was reading a friends blog the other day (Anthony & Sharon's) and they had a lot of friends that wanted to see what the squirrels looked like in their area :)... So I thought... why not do a blog post on our squirrels and other animals... I actually don't know what to call this animal... at first glance it looks like a squirrel... but his back markings make him look like a chipmonk... so I don't know... maybe it's a squirrel-monk.... They sure are cute though :) The lighter colored one is the girl :) So, my favorite color is Lime Green... they don't have green limes here, so if I said that color name, they would have no idea what I'm talking about... the closest color they have to that here is "parrot green"... We have awesome green parrots here! At this point, this is the best picture I have of one of them... it's through the window of the ICU :) We have lots of other cool animals - elephants, camels, cobras.... that I'll have...

An awesome couple that we're friends with - Jack & Cathy - are retiring... They have lived overseas most of their lives - and are retiring after a whole bunch of years... I can't remember how many... Anyway, we threw them a big party! They love elephants and we thought - there couldn't be a better theme... "Elephants never forget - and we will never forget you!" :) Adam and I hired the elephant - it was pretty cool! - weeks before the party, they came over to our house and showed us all of the elephant packages we could purchase... some of them included some super-fancy dressings on the elephant! The package we got, involved some pretty cool paintings on the elephant! Jack & Cathy got to be the first ones to ride the elephant :) I love this pic (below)! Cathy is so fun! (But then again, you have to be to live overseas for so long ;) ) Here are Jack & Cathy on the elephant! - I think this pic is cool! It was funny because we called the elephant guys a...

Here's some pics from some of the most memorable moments of 2007 :)