Incredible !ndia

I'm not sure if you've seen the add campaign, but I've seen it everywhere. Not just here in India, but in The Economist, posters on bus shelters, billboards, everywhere. Bin and I are in Jaipur right now. Yesterday was a day that can only be described as incredible. We woke early and took the train from Delhi to Agra. We saw the Taj Mahal. Nice from afar, but slightly disappointing up close. We visited the Agra Fort too, then decided to take a bus to Fathepur Sikre to see another fort. That bus ride bought back a flood of memories of my travels throughout Africa with McHale. At the bus stop we got a bus that was to leave when it was full. But there was a political speech going on so the drivers were all listening to it. So then we heard another bus was leaving, so exited one bus for another that was so packed we couldn't even make it near the door. We returned to the other bus and waited. As soon as the speech was over the driver arrived and we left.

About 20 minutes of driving later we were back at the same bus station. Wait a few minutes then leave again. The road that we took was rural, paved when the British were there but never kept up. It was a dusty bumpy mess, as I sat next to a window that did not close. It took about two hours to cover 60km. When we finally arrived in Fathepur Sikre dusk was falling and the fort was closed, so we wandered around the tiny town as people stared in awe of me (being white of course). We met some nice people, had some chai, and went by the side of the road to wait for the bus to Jaipur. It arrived after 15 minutes, but the next 5 hours of my life I was almost scared to death by the maneuvers of this driver. Indian drivers are good, but aggressive, missing each other by centimeters. I did not want to sit close to the front for fear of actually seeing what the driver saw. We eventually arrived in Jaipur near midnight and spent an hour trying to find an available room. What a wonderful day.

I will, hopefully, have time to post photos of this adventure and others this weekend when Bin and I go to his house in Calcutta...

Whitewash

First snow of the year is here! Just a dusting, but it looks beautiful from my bedroom window. I know it's nothing like what in Chicago, but a nice reminder of home.

Creatures

I had an interesting experience last week. Julia, Carlos, the Iranian, and I went to a Dutch graduation party. Well, we sort of crashed the party. Julia was friends with one of the guys in the band and he invited us. So, at about 11:30PM on a Friday night, instead of going to a pub for a beer or two, we had a different type of evening.

The party was as a fraternity house. Apparently fraternity members do not reside there, but have it as a public space. And the space can be rented out as well, as was the case last Friday. The party was for Catalijn, who now has a masters (I think) in physics! As we arrived, a group of friends were reciting poems to honor her. I don't know what they were about, since they were in Dutch, but it seemed like roast. When that was done the band started playing again, but no one danced. It seems that Dutch parties are similar to American parties, everyone talks and no one dances. But we started to dance, and dance, and dance until 2AM, when we were a bit tired and the party seemed to be ending. Thought it wasn't the best party I've ever been to, it was lots of fun, since it was so different. Hopefully we can find more parties to crash...

Sweet Home Chicago

Last weekend I was in Chicago, back home for the second time this year. This trip was much longer than last, it was six days instead of four, but this time there was much more to do. The reason that I went home was because one of my closest friends, Nicole, got married, thus much of my visit was spent doing things related to the wedding.

I've known Nicole since high school, almost 15 years, and the first adjective that could be use to describe her is, "late". One of my main duties as a bridesmaid was to make sure that she showed up on time. That was actually accomplished, give or take 20 minutes. We had appointments for hair and nails, dropping off dresses and picking up shoes, getting to synagogue, and we even made it to the rehearsal dinner on time just as the Saturday snow storm was icing over.

The wedding was beautiful. I consider myself a conservative Jew, but Nicole and Rudy are modern orthodox. So this wedding was similar to previous weddings that I had attended, but had a few differences. Most of what I was not used to was the separation of the men and women, not all the time, but only for certain parts. The men had bottles of liquor, the women had fruit salad and soda. The men entertain the groom and the women entertain the bride, so there was alot of dancing and singing. But after the ceremony the genders were once again mixed.

I didn't spent the whole weekend with Nicole, Rudy, and their families. I was able to spend some time with my own as well. On Friday morning I had the honor of waking up The Kid (my brother David). I think that it was more of me doing my parents a favor, since it is almost impossible to get my brother out of bed. After jumping on the bed, and poking at him with one of my old foils, he finally peeked his head out and declared, "I have nothing to wear." Exhibit A, to your right, is his closet.

Mom and I went to the Field Museum to see the exhibit on maps. It was incredible. They had over a millennia worth of maps. The docent said it would take about 45 minutes to view, but Mom and I spent about two hours there. I loved it, they had some of my favorite maps there (yes, there actually are some maps that I consider my favorites, such as the "Geological Map of England and Wales and Part of Scotland" by William Smith and "The loss of men during Hannibal’s march to Italy, 218 B.C. and Napoleon’s march to Moscow, 1812-13" by Charles Joseph Minard). We only had half an hour to look at the Darwin exhibit, but that was alright, since I preferred the maps. I hung out with Dad at his office and at the airport, drinking cups of tea. Every conversation with him I learn something.

Ruth was also in town, with Vince, so I got to see them at Connie and Greg's place (east meets west with the Chinese Christmas tree), plus for dim sum in Chinatown. Drew joined us as well. It was nice to see him again. He is letting me borrow one of his bike boxes so I was able to bring my racing bike back to Delft. It was surprisingly easy, though the box is a bit awkward, I did not have to pay an extra fee to bring it with. It is my baby now. I took a long ride this morning, the sun was out, though so was the wind. I was so happy to be geared up and gliding through the wetlands, chatting with Julia (we were going slow since I'm not quite in the cycling shape I was before).

It think that was pretty much my whole weekend. Oh, I did some shopping. Some of it was in the shops, but most was looking through my parent's basement, peering though boxes that I packed a year ago, looking for my shoes that I swear I left right there (not recalling that our home is actually lived in and I cannot expect things to stay put for months). It was a really nice visit home. I got to see some snow, but leave before the storm hit (though I got to watch our plane being de-iced). Time to plan my next vacation.