saturday afternoon

finally a lazy day for james and I. got a terrific amount of sleep last night, and I think I'm finally beating this cold. just had a late lunch with Sangeeta; Raj, the cook, continues to work his magic. Today we had a chilled lentil-sprout, cucumber and tomato salad; potato curry; rice; chipatie; sauteed okra; and yogurt. right now james and I are relaxing in the living/dinning room both on our laptops, under the perpetual ceiling fans, listening to modest mouse. I think he's writing a letter to Chelsea, his girlfriend.

when I was doing research at the Hare Krishna temple last week, a trio of girls approached and started talking to me. They all gave me their numbers and two of them seemed to be encouraging the third to talk to me. Very weird, but funny. So, a few days later, I got a call from the third one (Sonal) while on the train to Pushkar; she was asking me out to coffee--and clearly interested going on a date with me. Well, sadly (perhaps) for Sonal, I don't think there is any romantic future for the two of us. But last night James and I were feeling very carefree, thinking of seeing a movie, so we decided to call these girls up and see if they wanted to hang out.

They were very pleased we had called, and invited us over to their flat, which happens to be just a few minutes walk from Sangeeta's. We thought, "well, this should be a riot no matter what it turns out to be," so we got dressed and ventured out. Oddly enough, being invited over to an Indian girls' flat who we barely know violates so many expectations and rules of decorum that we were coached in during orientation. So much for that.

So we took a motor-rickshaw over there and awkwardly sat down in the living room with these three Indian girls and these two Quebecois girls--who happened to have just arrived the previous night, didn't know them, and were couch surfing there. The seven of us had a very odd, sometimes raucous, sometimes stilted conversation and then moved on to dinner. (this was the second dinner for James and I, but we didn't want to be rude). Repeatedly, I was seated next to Sonal, which I sure was no coincidence. I hadn't felt like this since middleschool. She kept on looking at me and smiling. Poor Sonal. (Hey, I'd probably be too weird for her anyway if the language barrier didn't prevent all but the most superficial conversation).

We had a film rental delivered; this movie "Chuk'h Dae India!" that is all abuzz in India right now. About the triumphant rise of the womens' field hockey team. We got thru the first half before James and I decided to call it a night. It was very awkward telling them we needed to go to bed, verging on rude. At the very least, they expected us to finish the movie, as any normal guest would. But James and I were getting a strong feeling that it was more prudent for us to leave, so James started talking about how tired we were. We apologetically thanked them for a nice evening. We were exiting when it became clear that two of the Indian girls, Sonal and her more english-fluent friend, were going to walk us home. A few yards later, we heard the rest of them walking quickly to catch up.

James and I found ourselves in this walking gang of Indian and Quebecois girls, moving thru this posh Delhi neighborhood at 1am. About halfway home we told them we could find the rest of the way on our own. After we parted, James pointed out that they might have all been hoping for good night kisses! (at least the Indian girls). One of the things we were told is that Indian men and women often have very odd expectations about dating in the U.S. Mostly what they know about U.S. courtship conventions they have learned (and believe verbatim) from the random selection of Hollywood romantic-comedy blockbusters; additionally, the exaggerated impression left by American free-love in the 70s still lingers strongly here. As such, Indian men expect white girls to be very easy, and Indian women expect white guys to move very quickly, and pull all the moon-lit good-night kissing moves. I think James was absolutely right in his interpretation--very bizarre and pretty hilarious, too.

I'm going to see if I can find a pool to go swimming at this afternoon. Early to bed, then wicked early to rise for 5:30 am train to Varnassi tomorrow.