Poonam -- finally final Goa post

 Over the course of my trip in Goa, it was decided that my current Hindi name was unacceptable (Jamuna) and I should be rebranded Chandni (moonlight). These things happen. I am pretty content to be renamed every time I come to India, because I seem to be a different version of myself each trip anyhow. In most cases I'm just Wyerlet, and I'm just fine with that also. Well, in order to commemorate the experience, I decided to get it tattooed on me (just kidding, it's black henna, although there are plenty of people that do decided to randomly get tattooed here, a girl in the hostel came back from Goa with the batman sign "because batman is cool"). The best part of the experience was chatting with the lovely girl who drew it on me.

Her name is Poonam, she's 18 and Gujarati. It's hard to tell from the photo but she had the most lovely light brown eyes. At first she was shy, speaking in a Russian-ish accent in English (seriously this place is crazy colonized), but when she realized she could speak in Hindi, she loosened up, started joking and showed her true colors as a sort of mischievous, teasing little sister. She reminded me of someone I know at home, in that regard... While the henna was drying we started talking about Mumbai, and she said she was going to visit for the first time in a few weeks. Her excitement was electric, talking about the Bhel Puri she would eat at Juhu (after I confessed my love for it as well), and the shopping that she was going to do. After Mumbai, she had a couple days and then she was going to get married (!). She she showed me pictures of her engagement and her fiance. She seemed to be genuinely pleased to marry him despite the fact that he was sort of fat (her words, he didn't really seem big to me). Pulling up a picture of him on the computer, that she confessed she hated using, she pointed out his nose, saying she always tells him it looks like a samosa.

More people and places tomorrow.
Love,
Violet