and life goes on...

I'm sitting on the grass outside of the library at the University. It's the second day of class, and a bunch of us are here waiting for it to be time to go to a talk about the different kinds of cultural activities we can do (i.e. drumming, sitar, dancing, etc.).

We still don't have internet, so it's been a while since I've been able to update. Eventually my plan is to copy a lot of what I've been writing in my journal and to put it in here, but for now I'll just tell you that I'm still alive and well.

Scheduling here is the most chaotic process ever, at least to an outsider. The class times are extremely fluid, and often a class will meet at 3 different times during the week. Then, just when you think you have it all figured out, the professors decide that they would like the time to be at some other time, and everything has to be figured out all over again. There is no master list of classes, and no class limits, and everyone just shows up and hopes for the best. I've already missed one class because I thought it met from 3-5, but when I showed up I realized that they had changed the time from 2:15-4:15. Oops.

You know you're in India when:
The cars sing when they're put in reverse
You're walking home from class and realize that you're trapped between a herd of cows and a bright green dump truck filled to the brim with people.

I don't quite have a routine yet, but things seem to be calming down a little. I'm settling down and making friends. We've gone to an open air market, and also to a planetarium/children's museum. The whole thing was like something out of Lost in Space...there were great special effects from the 70s and a whole room full of an old computer. However, even though the graphics of the planetarium seemed to be decades old (and the style was quite cheesy as well, although that might be simply a symptom of Indian culture), I did notice that they carefully refrained from calling Pluto a planet. Then after that, we got into a big discussion about the meaning of life and where we fit into the cosmos. Yep, I've met other philosophy/religion nerds.

Anyways, it's time for me to start on the way to our next event. Hopefully I'll have time to update a little more extensively soon.