It's a Small World

While visiting my friend from U of C in Delhi, we happened upon this priceless restaurant, "Piccadelhi". It was really confusing to be in India, with a friend from America in an London underground themed restaurant (especially because I've been in London more recently than I have been in New York). I couldn't help being a tourist and taking incredibly obnoxious flash photography inside (yes, I did take a picture of the menu). And to top it off, we walked in and all we had was water (it cost 100 rupees though, so I couldn't feel bad). At least we didn't light anything on fire. More Jaipur tomorrow.

Love,

Violet

Dance Fever

These pictures are from the cultural performance that we saw in Pushkar. The detail shot from yesterday is also from this show. There may or may not also be a video of me dancing with the performers. Luckily, said hypothetical video is too big for me to post online, so you will have to be content with seeing it (hypothetically, of course) when I get back. I don't know what came over me. I blame dehydration and sun exposure. I called up Pushkar officials and tried to get them to change their slogan to "what happens in Pushkar, stays in Pushkar" but they didn't like the ring of it in Hindi. So I will just have to live with the embarrassing videos that will inevitably surface when I run for President. Hopefully the American public finds Indian dance moves and camel riding endearing.

Glad I'm back? I missed you too.

Love,

Violet

I'm baaaaack!

Instead of trying to make up for missed time I am going to give you the greatest hits of my time here as chosen by my teachers. In case any of you were misinformed, I didn't win this scholarship because of merit, I won it because they want to make me the official spokesperson. At least that is what it seems from the picture board. This is the only board of pictures for all 50 students. Can you play Where's Violet/Waldo and count how many times I appear? I'll give you a hint, I'm in one of the three in the top most row. I included a detail shot for your pleasure.

I hope you didn't miss me too much.

Love,

Violet

Impromptu Break

So my computer battery died. I should have seen it coming. Apparently the voltage makes electronics crazy. I hope that I will be able to post again soon. If it takes too long or looks like it won't be fixed at all then everyone will have to make do with no pictures and the promise of an extra long slideshow when I get home. Wish me luck!

Love,

Violet

Happy Indian Birthday Daddy!

Perhaps you would like to put on your cowboy boots and mosey on down to Delhi in order to get your beard trimmed. Try not to be offended by all the questions about why American men loose their hair while Indian men keep their luscious locks. I have been told that the best answer to the question is that it has to do with the water.

I love you daddy! Happy B-day!

Love,

Violet

Qutub Minar aka more delhi more belly

This was a beautiful sight in Delhi. The park was filled with beautiful ruins and mosques. If only it had been under 110 degrees (not including humidity). Then maybe it would have been a little nicer. In Delhi there were a lot more foreigners (or as the locals say "foreigner-voreigners). I find myself staring at them just like Indians stare at me. Dekho! Ek Gora! (Look a whitey!) Should I introduce myself? "Hello, I'm Violet. Why yes I am also white!". I thought better of it, mostly because I was too shy. I wanted to have some tourist take my picture because they would be less likely to steal my camera, but just before break my friend had a dream that she asked some white guys to take her picture with her nice camera and then ran off with it. Clearly this idea has traumatized me. So you will have to deal with pretty pictures of buildings instead of pictures of pretty Violet (that's a lie, it would have been pictures of sweaty Violet, not pretty Violet anyhow).

Love,

Violet (pretty and sweaty at the moment)

India Gate

Any local and some non-locals I have talked to all say the same thing, that I have picked a terrible time to visit India and I must be crazy to be here now. I disagreed with everyone except for the people from Delhi. I'll tell you why. Delhi is hosting the Common Wealth Games in October of this year, which means they are putting in 2 new metro lines and sprucing everything up. So all of the popular sites look like the arch pictured. Everything is torn up and there is scaffolding everywhere. Now, I could have look past that except for it also meant that going from any place to another meant about at 45 min wait in traffic. That I just can't tolerate. I'm a if-the-cab-doesn't-move-for-2-mins-get-out-and-walk kind of girl. So the long periods of time in the car drove me nuts. Especially because I was sightseeing by myself. All my loser tourist alarms were going off. I was always happy to get to walk around and take pictures of any random thing when I got out of the car though. Aha! Learning the motivations of my prey. This will come in handy when I'm back in New York with full on pedestrian rage. More Delhi tomorrow. Hopefully less Delhi-belly.

Love,

Violet