My Indian (Grand)parents

I live in Jaipur now. In Rajasthan. In the wonderful Indian home of Prabha and Naveen Lal Ji. I have their son's old room, and Alexia (my housemate) has the upstairs room,which once belonged to their daughter. Their children are 40+ years old now, so I don't have to worry about competition for my bed. Hugging is generally frowned upon in India between members of different genders, and generally when you meet an older person there are certain social norms in Canada that say you probably shouldn't hug them...but such was NOT the case for Prabha. She greeted me with the ever-present twinkle in her eye and turned my handshake into a warm hug! They are such fantastic people. They are remarkably progressive for the older Indian generation: they tutor children from the nearby slum, have Muslim and Christian friends (they are Hindu), know how to use a computer (sort of), have traveled to other countries (they've been to Canada!), and they've had students from all over the world stay with them for the past 15-20 years. In short, Alexia and I hit the jackpot with our Indian family.

I am a huge nerd. I spend my days writing papers and going to the University of Rajasthan, where our group has our classes. Luckily the University is only a 15 minute walk from our house. A highlight was an ultimate game we had with some American students we met (and 1 or 2 Indian guys that tried to learn the game as well). It was great to play a real 7 on 7 game. I miss it a lot these days, although a few of us toss the disc during our lunch break in the hot sun.

Another highlight is watching Cricket matches after dinner with Naveen. Well, Cricket interspersed with hilarious corny Indian soap opera's. Oh man. You don't even know bad acting/filming until you've seen these. But Cricket is sweet! We played a game with some Indian students we met back in Mysore, and now I feel I could get into watching this. A few of us plan on attending a Rajasthan Royals game in the upcoming weeks.

Well...that's all for me. I had mutton kebab's. They are typical Rajasthani food. deee-lish! Tonight we're heading out for a week long adventure to some other places. I'll tell you about it later. Peace.