The Colors are Coming... whoo hoo!!!

Yeah!!! Holi is coming!! This is one of my favorite holidays! This is the holiday where people run around like crazy and have water guns, water balloons and colored powders and dyes to throw on each other :) It's very messy, very colorful and very fun!

This is a little boy (below) that has been sitting outside of our neighborhood selling colored powders and things for Holi :)

We were at a BIG old bazar yesterday and saw lots of people selling colors and things for Holi...

Today (Saturday) is the day before the colors. Today is the day that is actually called Holi and tomorrow is called Dhulendi... but I'm just going to call it Holi... It's all really a part of the Holi holidays and it's just plain easier to call it all Holi... So anyway, tonight, at the rise of the moon, they make HUGE bonfires that are supposed to represent funeral pyres that destroyed Holika (a demoness). Here's a picture (below) of a bonfire from last year in M-town.

One of the most crucial parts to the bonfire are the "poo patties". This lady (below) was in the bazar yesterday and is selling some of the specialized "poo patties" for tonight.

OK, so now I'm going to tell you about my favorite sweet... and yes, it is pretty bad placement to put my favorite food right after my story about poo... but oh well... My favorite sweet in this country is only made for this holiday, so it definitely deserves a shout-out! - it is the BEST sweet EVER!!!! It's called gujhia. It's like a donut with coconut and syrup inside!! It's sooo good!! The guy below is selling us some gujhia!!

These guys below are making our gujhia :)

And last - but not least... back by popular demand... MORE BANGLES!!

Comments

Anonymous said…

Ohmygoodness! Is it that time of year again?

I remember Holi... I about had a nervous breakdown. I was the target of much "Eve teasing" the week leading to the Big Day, and I did NOT handle it well. Definitely my own personal culture stress issue. :)

Anyway, I ended up staying home while all the rest of my team went out and played with the colors. At the time I was glad I did, but looking back on it now, I wish I'd sucked it up and joined the fun.

Hope you had a great day today!

9:46 AM

Funny Things 2 - American Fair Edition

We just got back from Roadtrip #8 in Macon, GA. It was an awesome trip!! So, before we head out on the next trip, we went to the North Florida Fair! The fair is always famous for it's fried foods... they fried everything!!... They had fried/breaded zucchini, Mushrooms, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Onions, green tomatoes, okra, pickles, etc :) I had a lot of it too - YUM! Now, I'd heard of fried Snickers & twinkies (which they had) but they also had FRIED OREOS & PEANUTBUTTER CUPS :) The fair was cool. They had a shark show and a sea lion show... but our favorite was the pig races :) haha!!! It was hilarious!! Aashini was close up to the race until the pigs came - then she crawled up into Adam's lap really fast :) (as seen below) :) Pig races! haha! Cracks me up!

Dusshera 2012

This year, our neighborhood was quite active for Dusshera. At one end of our street, one of the major political parties here, set up a Dusshera celebration. Here are some guys putting the effigies together and filling it full of fireworks! They had quite the political statement for their celebration. (Basically that expensive water, fuel, electricity, diesel, gas, etc and FDI (bringing in foreign companies like Wal-Mart) are like Raverna (the demon god)... and are the evils of today....) Here's their set-up at the end of our street.... you can't see it very well, but they had all three effigies there that they burned.... They burned VERY quickly at this one... So quickly that by the time I pulled out my camera, it was already on the ground!! Our street looked like those CNN videos of rioting cities :) haha!! There was burning stuff all over the street :) Many people will get a piece of the leftover wood/bamboo...

Starbucks!

Starbucks opened in our city last night!! I'm not a huge coffee drinker... but I was excited about the opening!! (I think I like Starbucks because of all the green! haha!... Aashini and Diya think the mermaid on the logo looks like me... haha! Maybe it's the weird wavy hair :)... not sure :) ) Anyway, we got there and the line was SUPER long! The wait time was about 45 minutes!!! There were so many people there!!! I tried to get a pic of all the people... (that's why this picture is at an annoying angle... I was trying to get it all in in between the columns :)) Here's Aashini doing a jumping picture!! The girls tried to do a jumping picture :) haha! haha! They had a few spills along the way :) I never got them both jumping :) Stuff for sale.... OK, one more because I think they are cute :) haha! People waiting in line :) Some friends that made it insid...

..SouthAsiaRocks..

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