..SouthAsiaRocks..

Traffic here can be so frustrating at times. People drive everywhere (and sometimes on both sides of the road) so traffic jams happen a lot! The other day one of the intersections' traffic lights were out. This caused some serious problems with the traffic. After a bit of craziness, a man with a stick came out and decided to direct the traffic. The whole time he was directing traffic I kept wondering how people in America would react to something like that. This guy was really good at directing traffic. Everyone listened to him too... it could be because he had a big stick... but either way he was very helpful :) One of those random funny South Asia things :) I thought it was awesome and he really got the traffic moving :)

Right now we're in holiday season over here. This time of year is my favorite. It's pretty much one big constant holiday right now until January. Right now a big holiday called Navratri (or Navratra) is going on. It's a special 9 day holiday (Navratra is Sanskrit for 9 days)... but actually the holiday in our area of the country is 10 days... The 10th day is Dusshera (the day the burn the huge statues). You're supposed to fast from any food if you can (most people don't), but if you can't you're supposed to eat special fasting foods. The ways that people celebrate, fast & do rituals are very different. Generally, this is the thought: For this holiday, you are supposed to eat one meal a day (usually after sunset before your bath). You are supposed to bathe both morning and evening You can have juice, milk & fruit during the day. For this holiday, they are supposed to fast from grains, garlic, onions, eggs or meat (some Hindus do eat meat). ...

Yesterday was Adam's Birthday! Our awesome friend Erin babysat Aashini so we could go out! We haven't been on a date in forever, so it was fun :) First we went out to eat at an Italian place called "Spaghetti Kitchen" - it was fancy and REALLY good! Adam's fave food is Italian, so we just had to try it out :) Of course the restrauant was in our mall - we love our mall :) haha! After we ate we went to a fun "paint-your-own-pottery" place in the mall. Adam and I used to go to a place like this in Tallahassee called "Waddle Pots" back in college, so it was fun to get to do it again :) So we painted fun mugs :) I made Adam his birthday present :) It was fun :) HaPpY BirThDaY AdAm!!!

Sundays at the mall are pretty fun. It's the only day of the week that most people aren't working (unless they're in the business of selling things, if so, it's their busiest day!). Since people aren't working, they like to go out and do fun or relaxing things. The malls, markets and parks are usually packed! The mall by our house usually has some sort of event going on every Sunday. This past weekend they had a whole section of the mall giving out free food samples. There were about 30 booths of free food! Food samples are NOT common here, so it was very fun for us - felt like being at Sam's Club in America on a Saturday... I digress.... so anyway, a week or so ago, they had a contest on Sunday for the Most Fashionable Mom. They have been advertising this contest for over a month, so I guess the people involved were the finalists. It was quite hilarious! To start with, each mom had to walk down the runway (while the fog machine went crazy! it was awes...