What did you do over the holiday?

Oh my goodness... my students are great.

I have them write a reflection after every test, and every time we have any days off from class I have them write about what happens during the holiday. Last week we had the entire week off; HH the Dalai Lama was teaching Monday-Thursday, and so Tibet Charity decided to just close for the whole week since it didn't make much sense to have class only on Friday.

This evening I was procrastinating, whining internally about having to grade so many tests (not that many, really.. it was definitely whining) – I studied Hindi, I graded a little at a time and rewarded myself with other activities like rewinding the yarn I bought or doing push-ups, or making a list of reasons to stay until December and another list of reasons to leave a few weeks early. Eventually I decided to just buckle down and finish grading. After I got through the tests – which wasn't that bad – I remembered I still had to correct the papers on what they'd done last week.

Once I actually started doing it it went so quickly... lol... Their writing is a bit dry and predictable (usually) when they have to write about “your daily routine” or when they are asked to answer specific questions. When I let them write about what they want, though, some of them get really creative. I have a few students who must be getting pretty comfortable with me and/or with the English language, because they express these colorful, lively stories.

As it turns out, a few of my students went out to the Rewalsar/Manali area last week as well. One told me about how he and his friend got sick on the bus and threw up on the way to Rewalsar. He said that when he got there he “saw lake and statue so strong faith, but in the lake lot of fish so a little compassion.” Only Buddhists! He also worked in some of the vocabulary words we'd been using in conversation class. He did not vomit on the way back.

Another student, one of the monks, told me about how he and a friend went down to Lower Dharamsala to shop, and how they stopped for sweets and sweet tea. They met another friend on the way back who suggested they all go get some more sweets – and how they had a fun little discussion about how they couldn't keep eating like that because they'd get sick, and it's a good thing he bought new shoes to exercise!

Part of the test was to answer questions like “What do you always do?” and “What do you sometimes do?” Many of them answered that they always study English, but one said she always dances at home. I gave all of those answers smiley faces. Maybe they'll get stickers, too.

A few of my students begin nearly every writing assignment with “Hi dear teacher, how are you?” or “Dear teacher Magda...” I think it's cute. It's stuff like this that makes me want to stay. Regardless of when I leave, I'm going to miss them. I have a few of their email addresses; I'll have to get more of them. Maybe I can connect with some of them on Google+ (where you can filter who sees what much more easily than you can on Facebook). I have a few who ask if I'm teaching conversation class or if another teacher is; I suspect that they play favorites, and I know at least one of them comes to my class and not the others. I admit it makes me feel a little warm and fuzzy inside.

As far as the coming-home plans, it looks like financially it'll be pretty much a wash between staying until December or coming home a few weeks early. I'll see how I feel after the trip to Rajasthan, I guess. There are plenty of teachers here and I spoke to the boss, who said it would be fine to go whenever I wanted, so that's nice to know.

On an unrelated note, it looks like my room threw up on my bed. I'm an artist, I tell ya... that's my story and I'm sticking to it. Organized chaos: it's how I work best. I like having things neat and clean, but somehow I can never keep them that way for long. It just seems to futile to constantly be putting things away when you know they're just going to get taken out again... right? Plus when it's as humid as it is here, you almost have to leave your clothes out in an attempt to let them dry, unless you aren't concerned about that pesky mildew smell.

And now, since I did manage to finish grading all of these tests, I think I am going to reward myself with a bit of knitting before I get back to studying Hindi, or designing some kind of grammar drills for class. I think they need a little more structure in their writing assignments, and it's my job to provide that. Giving them sentences on the board to correct as a class has also gone over well in the past; I should come up with some more of those to give them. Hmmm......

Suggestions?

A lack of beggars

One of the differences we'd noticed in Manali was a lack of beggars roaming the streets. In Dharamsala there are days when you can't walk fifteen feet without having someone call out "Sister, hello! Hello! Namaste!" or a woman with a baby on her hip come up, tap you on the shoulder and say "No money, milk. Hungry baby." You feel bad, but you also can't save everyone. Apparently the ones who ask for things other than money, like milk, take these items and sell them back to the shopkeepers. I've heard stories that the children don't even always belong to the women holding them; one of my students told me the beggars go to daycare centers, borrow the kids, and return them along with a share of the day's profits in the evening.

Anyway, we're back in D'sala and that means our reprieve from the begging has come to an end. Manali was also a lot cleaner. Oh well.

Something else I first noticed in Manali but that has also carried over in other areas of the mountainous Himachal Pradesh is a profusion of sweater vests. This makes me happy. Well, their presence in general makes me happy, being a knitter... the fact that they are all made out of what is obviously cheap acrylic makes me sad. There are sheep and goats around here, you'd think they'd have some woolen goodies to wear. I guess all the good stuff gets exported. I've been working on a pair of fingerless gloves lately, because I forgot to bring some from home and I have a feeling I'll need them before too much longer. I'm a little bummed that I'm missing fall at home, but oh well. You can't have everything. I guess I'll just have to settle for spring when it rolls around.

In English teacher news, my students took their Unit 3 test today. This means that they'll probably get through 6 or 7 chapters total by the end of the semester, out of the 9 in the book. I guess that's not too bad, right? According to the veteran teachers, it's next to impossible to actually finish the book in the amount of time we have, so I'm not worrying too much about it. It looks like I'll be spending the evening grading.......

Oh yeah, don't send me any more stuff please. I am kicking around the idea of cutting my trip a little short and coming home earlier than originally planned... I don't want anything showing up here after I've left, because it'll be a real pain to get back! India's great, but I have things I want to work on at home. We also have had a big influx of teachers at Tibet Charity, so it's not like I'll be leaving them hanging if I take off a little early. I was actually the only teacher who was scheduled to be here the entire semester anyway, which I didn't realize until I got here; everyone else signed up for one to three month stints. I guess I'll see how the next couple of weeks go and go from there. Even if nothing changes, I'll be back in Chi-town on December 6th -- less than 2 months away!

Just because I think this post needs a picture:

This one's for my runner friends.

No, I didn't go. I didn't even bring my running shoes to India, which is probably for the best... the roads are really dirty here and I'd be really sad if I ruined the only comfortable pair of shoes I've ever owned (Reebok RealFlex for the win).

Catch you guys later!

A walk in the woods and back to D'sala

For our final full day in Manali we wound up yet again at Dylan's.

We did try the cookies, and they were in fact delicious.

See that guy in the bottom right corner of the second photo? He's a crew dude for Cirque du Soleil. He and his gf/travel partner are from Montreal. We had a fun little conversation with them about the awesomeness of the Cirque and how cool it must be to travel all over the world with it.

The proprietor of the shop is the guy standing behind him making someone's beverage. At one point he asked about my tattoo, so that led to a discussion about knitting and how everyone in the tribe he's from learns to knit. We talked about crops (apparently they grow some of the only peas in India) and knitting and all kinds of things. He said he'd try to find a place in Manali for me to buy good, local yarn; it wasn't very helpful, though, because we didn't have much more time in town. I was surprised at how difficult it had been to find locally-produced yarn in the Himalayan mountains.

We decided to go for a walk to Vashisht, a little town with temples and hot springs. Here are some scenery pix for you...

We eventually reached the hot springs (I found a little shop with some supposedly local yarn along the way; it looks handspun and it's definitely in need of a good washing. What should I make? A shawl, maybe?) and saw some more intricate carvings on the sides of the temples there.

Hot water straight from the springs.

From there we took a tuk-tuk back to Manali and had a nice, relaxing evening.

We walked back from New Manali to Old Manali through the park.

Coke made with real sugar, and a quesadilla that was surprisingly good.

We got foot/leg and shoulder massages!

The next morning it was time to go, so we bade farewell to one last Manali sunrise.

Bye bye, Manali. Perhaps we'll meet again.

And then it was around 7 hours to get back to Dharamsala. There weren't enough people to fill the minibus we were originally scheduled to take, so we got to ride in a taxi for a fraction of the usual taxi price. Along the way we stopped for lunch at a hotel where I saw this guy making fresh naan & roti.

Yum!

With that, I am back in Dharamsala for a while. Brij and I spent the evening watching soccer, eating momos, and trading movies & music. So far today all I've done is slept in, written this blog, and half-assedly helped plan a trip to Rajasthan (the others are doing most of the work). Oh, and looking at potential jobs for when I get back. Does anyone know of a place that will need someone in, say, January? The catering biz gets a little slow after the holidays and I'm going to need some kind of income to pick up the slack, especially since I'm using up my savings while I'm here in India. It's alright, though.........

More Manali

One more way India differs from the US: if you want a cup of coffee in the morning – at least one that isn't the instant powdered kind – you're going to have to wait. You know how most cafes, Starbuckses, etc are open by 5 or 6 in the morning? Yeah, here they chill until 9. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that the locals all drink tea.... I suppose it's a really nice thing if you work in one of these cafes, but if you are a visitor looking for that morning caffeine fix, you might want to seek alternatives.

So, dear readers, while I am waiting for 9am to roll around I will be a good little blogger and tell you about the last couple of days, since as you may have noticed I was slacking a little bit on that front.

We've arrived in Manali on Tuesday evening. The first couple of days were spent exploring, sightseeing, and generally wandering around.

Yep, real life snake charmer.

We did fun things like visit one of the old local Hindu temples.

There is some really intricate wood carving on some of the old buildings in Manali, unlike I've seen in other places. Oh, and skulls.

Gill and I sat on a yak. It was very soft, but not quite as big as I expected. Maybe smaller yaks are easier to maintain here at relatively low altitudes (around 2000 meters).

We took some photos..

This is a Tata Nano. I see more cars like this here than any other... doesn't it kinda look like my Yaris at home?

The marigolds (and roses, and everything else) get really tall here, presumably from all the monsoon rain.

It's apple season in Himachal Pradesh.

If you look closely you can see both English and Tibetan writing on this wall under the painting. I found it to be a nice change from English overtaking everything it contacts; here the English has been covered up by Buddhist art.

Oh yeah, the hotels have cool names. Ours is called "The Dragon."

Yesterday for breakfast we decided to check out a little place we'd passed earlier called “Dylan's.” It, like the few other cafes that carry the stuff, advertises that you can get real brewed coffee there.

It was pretty darn good.

Verity finally found a good soy cappuccino!

What's that, you say? Fresh pineapple mint juice? Don't mind if I do...

There was a cast & crew running around Manali all day shooting some film, so we watched that for a while. They did not ask us to be extras (inconsiderate jerks).

After our nice relaxing morning we wandered down toward New Manali to purchase some gifts (and maybe a couple of things for ourselves, too).

Not the greenest city park I've ever seen...

No, I did not try one.

Later, Marie, Verity, and I took a detour through the woods near the river:

and found this cool tree:

and then on the way back into town we wandered down a side street filled with dhabas. They were impressed that I could decipher this sign:

In case you're wondering, it's: Chai - Coffee - Omelet in the red, and the blue reads: Veg momo, Chicken momo, Fried momo... (I'm actually not sure what the first word on the second line of blue says), then Soup, Chowmein, Dal, Chavel (which means rice). Cool, eh?

The three of us decided to try some dessert at the little place across the main road from our hotel, The Bee's Knees. I'm not sure if I mentioned it before, but in Dharamsala most of the businesses that provide wi-fi to their customers have passwords that reflect the spiritual, heavily Tibetan makeup of the town: “compassion,” “thankyousomuch,” “ilovemandala,” or sometimes more food-oriented ones like “bananacake” or “mochaccino.” It's cute. You get used to expecting a sweet, New-Age-y answer when you ask for the password after ordering your ginger lemon honey tea. That being said, you may be able to imagine our reaction when we asked for the password at The Bee's Knees and was told...

are you ready for this?...

“1nightstand69.”

Bahahahahaha.... well played, Bee's Knees cafe.

As I was telling my sister last night, I'd be alright with coming home any time now. I like it here, and I have actually been feeling a surprisingly low level of homesickness (maybe it's because I know I'll be back soon), but what I have been feeling lately is a sense that I have things to do – and I have to be home to do them. I miss my job and the paycheck it brings. Money certainly isn't everything, not by a long shot, but when you've spent two straight months spending your savings and not making much back, if any, then it gets a little tiring. Life in India is cheap, but it isn't free.

In closing, I leave you with photos of some of the local doggies: