You can take the girl out of college...

So I'm going home for two weeks for Christmas. Yes, I am flying from Mumbai, India to Boston, MA to spend two weeks at home. It should be very nice. I look forward to seeing family and friends and, of course, EATING! mmmmm....so much that I want to eat. Turkey and cranberry sauce, real chinese food (sans paneer and masala), hot pot, dim sum...oh the list goes on and on. And I plan on taking a lot of food back with me as well. Ooooh, home is so close I can almost taste it!

This morning I was thinking to myself, "Oh man, I have so much laudry to do...oh! I'm going home! I can bring it and get it done for free!" And then I realized, I wanted to bring my dirty laundry on a 20 hour flight, half way around the world, so I could do it at home for free and then bring it all the way back to India...It's like I was in college when I would bring home laundry over the weekend so I wouldn't have to pay 3 dollars a load, but instead of being an hour away, I'm 20 hours away and over a couple continents. It would be the most expensive load of laundry ever.

You can take the girl out of college, but you can't take the college out of the girl.

Happy Holidays all!

Must Read

Gender Bias Increases Poverty

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6162959.stm

It's Baroda Baby

Did you know you can buy export rejected bath mats by the kg? There's a stand in Baroda and they sell export rejected bath mats. But you can't buy just one, they're priced by the kg. You know, I was always really frustrated in the States because I always had to buy bath mats one at a time. That never satisfied my bath mat needs. But now, I can buy 3.5 kgs of bath mats and I'm all set. Finally! Someone who understands the consumer demand for export rejected bath mats!

Did I tell you that I have a little scooter? Yes, I have a little Sunny and I've named it BiBi because it's blue and it's my baby. It's sometimes difficult to get it started and it sometimes stalls in the middle of "the tunnel of death," but it's a nice little sunny. And even though traffic in India is ridiculous, it's easy because it's impossible to be a bad driver here. Cutting corners is a must, jutting out into oncoming traffic is the only way to get across the road, and it's not so important which side of the road you drive on. The only rule is to be aggressive. If you don't cut off three rickshaws you'll get beeps of impatience behind you. I don't know if I'll ever be able to drive normally again. Ok, I lied, there are also some rules of who has the right of way. Bicycles are at the bottom and yield to everyone (even dogs), then sunnies, proper motor bikes, cars, and then buses/trucks. However, the one thing that trumps them all is the all mighty cow.

We have a little stray dog living in our parking lot downstairs. I've named him Scrappy. He's got droopy ears and the most terrified eyes I've ever seen. Before, I always wondered why we only had one dog hanging around and then last night I figured it out. Scrappy is the only one skinny and flexible enough to squeeze under our gate. It's a great feat of acrobatics to see him get under. I was going to start feeding him until I realized he probably wouldn't be able to fit under the gate then, so I decided against it. But we're lucky, lots of the stray dogs are really mean and crash into moving vehicles. But Anurag, my homestay buddy, taught me a trick. If there are dogs coming near you, just bend down like you're picking a rock off the ground and when you stand back up all the dogs will have scattered away. It really does work. But I never have to do that with Scrappy. He's a good boy.