..SouthAsiaRocks..

This year's Holi was a little different than planned :) haha! Aashini was super excited about Holi this year! Last year she was pretty terrified, but this year she LOVED it! (for previous Holi posts, click HERE ). She came out with her huge water gun and quickly switched to her small one. She LOVED it! Here's a pic of Adam - just about the only one I got of him... Diya didn't like Holi very much. If water was squirted near her she freaked out. Aashini's favorite thing to do was to squirt the colors and "clean up" people's steps :) haha! Our little section of our neighborhood (about 20 houses) celebrates Holi together on this road (one of our balconies overlooks it). Here's some of our neighbors :) Here's Aashini having fun :) Here's a couple of our neighbors. The girl on the left lives upstairs from us and has a little sister that is Aashini's age - she plays with her most afternoons - it's awesome! Aashini having fun :) These...

Sorry for the lack of posting. Adam's mom and her friend Susan were in town, so I haven't had much time to post :) Holi wasn't as exciting for me this year. Adam was out of town, so I couldn't really do much with two little kids :) Aashini was a little freaked out. Our neighbors came over to "exchange colors" and Aashini wasn't sure what to think and ran and hid! Aashini's comfort "thing" are towels.... not sure why, but I got her a towel and she was happy running around the house and on the balcony with her towel. She had fun throwing water balloons later. It was cute :) Holi is a funny holiday. It's about the only time when everyone can act like a kid :) It's fun to see women who are usually quiet, throwing powder, dyes and shooting water guns at neighbors :) There were a lot of performers that came by our house this year. A lot of drummers and dancers. It was fun :) This picture makes me laugh :) At one point, I was on ...

Holi is quickly approaching :) Monday is Holi, but today Aashini celebrated Holi at her school. We didn't know what to expect (and asking questions didn't really help), so we prepared for a super messy Holi at school. We oiled up her hair and it looked so gross! Light colored hair can get permanently colored pink, purple or green after a day of Holi, so we didn't want to chance it. Anyway, it ends up that they played with flowers at school instead of color and this is all the color they put on their faces (along with mine & Diya's as we arrived to pick her up) :) All the kids were dressed up in nice clothes for the school party and Aashini was all oiled up and dressed in bummy clothes - haha! We were THOSE parents! haha! Have a Happy Holi !

Today was Holi! It was a pretty mild Holi for us... it was pretty calm in our neighborhood this year. The Capital is a lot calmer than M-town, and our neighborhood is pretty calm too. (If you want to look at past Holi blogs, click here! ) Holi is a very unique holiday. It's a holiday where both kids and adults alike smear colored powder on each other, pour buckets of dye on each other and throw water balloons. You can cover a complete stranger in dye and they can't get mad. It's pretty unique. Here's a pic below of a guy selling Holi supplies: Another thing that makes this holiday unique is it's one of two holidays here in our part of South Asia, where a majority of people that celebrate, consume Bhang. Bhang is the large green leaves and flowering shoots of mostly the male cannabis plant... yeah, marijuana. It is most commonly served as a cold drink made with yogurt. They also batter and fry it as well as put it as a little ball in the middle of sweets. There hav...

Today was Holi ... It's always quite an interesting day :) Click here to see previous Holi Blogposts :) Today was Aashini's first Holi and I'm not sure what she thought about it :) Aashini slept through the first half of it. Adam went out and played with the neighbors while I stayed in with Aashini . Some of our neighbors offered Adam the traditional Holi Bhang drink... It is a very "interesting" drink. If you want to learn more about it, click here: Bhang Recipe - BUT this is just for your cultural reading enjoyment. I DON'T recommend making it :) The main ingredient is Marijuana . Marijuana is technically illegal here BUT, it's allowed on certain religi 0us holidays and for religi 0us ceremonies. They also have government authorized Bhang shops that sell it... Although Holi in our part of the Capital isn't as fun as M-town Holi is, this year was much more exciting. More of our neighbors were out playing and it was fun :) The pic below i...

Happy Holi!! Today was Holi! Holi is a lot of fun! It is definitely different to celebrate it in the Capitol as opposed to M-town. In M-town we had all-out battles on the street and it was so fun! In our area of the Capitol, people stand on their roof or balcony and throw water balloons and things at the passers-by.... some people walk the streets and some people celebrate at their house with their friends and families... we did all of those :) We threw a lot of water balloons from our balcony at people... some just had water in them and some had dark purple dye... we also had some water guns (called pichari)... While we were waiting for people to pass by, Adam was juggling some water balloons... I got this picture (below) just as one of the water balloons popped on him! Hahaha the look on his face cracked me up! We had a fun Holi and got to hang out with some fun friends! Oh, and I ate TONS of gujhia!

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 par...