City of Joy

Namaskar from Kolkata, India!

I'm sitting here in a cute hole-in-the-wall cybercafe in my family's personal city of joy, Kolkata. Just thought I'd drop a quick line to update about my Indian adventure these last few days. Don't expect too much, though -- the server and computers here are quasi-ancient (read: rolling ball mouse) so I'll make this quick.

My flight here was unexpectedly a piece of cake. I flew from Detroit to Amsterdam, Amsterdam to Bombay, and Bombay to Calcutta. I watched in-flight movies, slept slept slept, ate fun airplane food (everything has its own tray compartment!), and read a book -- all thanks to a few doses of "Less Drowsy" Dramamine. I arrived in Kolkata on December 26 morning (Christmas night for my U.S. pals) and my mom and uncle picked me up at the airport. Luckily, my jet lag wasn't as bad as I thought it would be so I had no qualms about immediately stuffing my face with loochi thorkari, my favorite breakfast food here. I slept, had dinner with family, and you'd better believe I hit the beauty parlor and street market with my mom yesterday. Jet lag, schmet lag. In a lucky turn of events, my sister's village trip got cancelled and she came to Cal last night instead of next week. Yay! I get to spend two weeks with her instead of one, so I'm thrilled.

The weather has been quite chilly by India standards since it's winter here. However, the 55 degree winter weather here pales in comparison to the foot and a half of snow I left in Ann Arbor on Thursday. I'll take India, thank you very much.

Anyhow -- that's about it for now. I must run...to go shopping. I haven't updated my Indian wardrobe in 11 years so I'm "going ga ga" (Mom's words). I'll try to update again soon. Until then, Happy New Year!

xoxox