God's Own Land

I'm back in Delhi after a relaxing trip to a state in south India called Kerala (it's the green one on the southwest tip on the map with my face on it). Kerala is surprisingly urbanized for a state known for being lush and green. That's not the only unique thing about Kerala though: it has an elected communist state government (or that's what I think our lecturer said), it only consumes, since it's economy basically runs on the money of Non-Resident Indians who have gone to the Middle East or US, and it's 80% Catholic. We spent our time lounging in hotels, eating from the abundance of bananas and coconut flavored food, boating through the backwaters, and swimming in the Arabian Sea (beautiful!) Kerala is also famous for its Ayurvedic massages, which many girls in our group had. There were also tons of sari shops with intricate, heavy fabrics and elaborate jewelery, really kind of makes you want to be in a Bollywood movie so you can get all dressed up and dance around in those clothes.
Now I'm back in Delhi enjoying October because it's festival season =) Our neighborhood is all decorated for Navratri, which is basically a period of 9-10 days that are supposed to be very auspicious, so it is the time to make any investments or buy anything new or do basically anything that you want to turn out well. Navratri also means tasty fasting food I found out yesterday (as opposed to fast food). Instead of not eating at all, you don't eat certain foods, which means there are special foods you do eat, so basically, this is my kind of fasting! Last night my host family did a puja at home and tied a red string around my wrist (which they had already tied on each other when I was out of town) to symbolize the auspicious time. (The smoke detector IES required to be put in my room has since been taken out because when the whole neighborhood is burning incense is clay pots in the kitchen such things only make noise not sense...) Festival season will continue pretty much until Diwali, which I think is November 9, so this next month should be lots of fun =)

(another funny quote from my Hindi teacher: "Delhi autowalas treat everyone the same...above caste, creed, and sex [they are rude]."