Rakhi festival in Delhi: it was an awesome time spent with whole Pawan's family.
The idea of the festive is that sister ties on brother's hand "rakhi" which is sort of very embroider bracelet, she does it together with the blessing (this dot on the forehead, i forgot the name) and always give some sweets (btw. when they pray in the temple they always eat some sweets as well).
And the brother is supposed to give some money as well - this is other form of blessing here. Now I know why I've got money from this random guy in Kathgodam.
SO Pawan, his Mum, Dad and Sister - they took me along everywhere - first to hid Dad's family where I met all of them and as you can imagine - I was quite an attraction ;) They barely spoke English so I couldn't understand too much - only what Pawan translated. There was 2 Dad's brothers and 4 (?) sisters, and his Mother. She was very cute :) and a the end gave me blessings as well what was very very nice.
Basically that family is soooo much fun - they was joking and teasing each other all the time - so much of laughing. Like my family when we get together. In the meanwhile, when I couldn't understand what they were saying, I watched 2 wedding movies - of course from their family. It was so nice to see whole ceremony and recognize people who were sitting next to me. And what is very funny - to see how cheesy all those movies are made. It is unbelievable for us. In Europe - nobody would be able to accept sth like this.
Of course there was whole bunch of jokes about me and Pawan, that he has nice choice and bla bla bla ;)
Later on we went to his Mum's family as well, those people where a bit more calm, no joking that much, but very very nice as well.
All around I was basically very honored b/c I was eating with men, first, while all women were eating later and sometimes in other room or kitchen. I have got some great Indian food, some typical (some of them not necessarily very nice for me) drinks and a lot of different sweets.
That's how we spent entire day basically - visiting family and eating... I was eating half of what they were serving us but still I was fuuuuuulll... I dunno how they were able to eat all of that food - Indians have to have much bigger stomach.
Next day in Delhi - Pawan took me around, Quatab Minar (73 m-high tower of victory, built in 1193 by Qutab-ud-din Aibak immediately after the defeat of Delhi's last Hindu kingdom), Akshardham (complex dedicated to Hindu culture, music, religion, architecture), I saw a movie about 11-years old yogin Nilkanth Kalyan Yatra), 15 min boat ride through history of India.
With all respect to Indian culture and heritage, I discovered that all Indians, when they show you around, talk about something, they always emphasize - the biggest in India/world, the oldest, India was forst, India was the best etc. Sounds like there is some kind of complex and they want very badly to show off and mark India's position in the world . Anyways, some of that is true so they have right to do so. It just reminds me a bit of China and USA which want to be the best/the fastest/the biggest/ the most in general.
After Delhi - flew to Coimbatore and from there bus to Kotagiri.
First thing which I noticed - as a single traveller I attract way less attention that we used to as we were three of us. No one called me, no one wants to sell anything to me. Even though I'm in south. Well, Kotagiri is very small village, very very calm and extremely beautiful situated. 2300m above sea level, hilly, tea gardens all around, some forest, village spread all around those hills. Such a a beautiful place. There is 23 congregations all around here thus this place is calle Nilgiri's (name of the area where it is) Vatican.
I'm staying at fransiscan mission, where is formation house as well as a "house of joy" where live 9 blind girls, some of them a bit disabled, some are orphans.
It is unbelievble how happy and joyful they are,though they have some moments of sadness b/c of their hard life. But it definitely makes to think of your own life how happy and lucky you are with all what you've got.
Those blind girls are running their house completely on their own - except cooking. They clean the house every day, they clean the garden a bit, they do some knitting as their work. Furthermore b/c 15th of August is India's Independence day they are preparing some drama.
I'm taking part in all sister's prayers, sleeping a lot but helping as I can as well. I'm helping those disabled to do some manual work, helping in the around-house garden and in tea garden, reading some stories to those blind girls as they don't have too muchbooks written in Braille language.
I'm really enjoying this time here, resting a lot, thinking of my life and of myself and reading a lot - sister Katarzyna gave me nice book in polish! yay!!! :)
All sisters in this congregation are very very nice, though postulants are quite childish. it is surprising if you get to know that most of them are around my age or even older. But if you look that some of them didn't do any studies and are from small villages - it is not that surprising. Of course not all of them - some are very very nice and smart :) It would be too long to write it down (maybe one day) but from s. Katarzyna telling stories of their families I've learned quite a lot about this culture and life in India.
As I wrote, Satrurday is Independence Day and I will have to wear saree which I've got as a gift from Shweta. By accident I told sisters that I have a saree and that was my mistake. Every single sister when get to know that I will wear it starts laughing and yelling so much.. Seems once more that I will be quite an attraction for this time. Funny funny - me wearing saree with my blond, short hair and blue eyes... hahahaha.... we'll see.
Anyways, I think is time to go back home, since I already spent 1,5h in the internet cafe...
Talk to you later people!!
Ps. Oh! I forgot! One day I saw a bison - just walking around in the tea garden...
I was told sometimes they come in groups of 10-15 and walk around those tea gardens.... I think I don't want to meet any of them eye to eye ;)
The idea of the festive is that sister ties on brother's hand "rakhi" which is sort of very embroider bracelet, she does it together with the blessing (this dot on the forehead, i forgot the name) and always give some sweets (btw. when they pray in the temple they always eat some sweets as well).
And the brother is supposed to give some money as well - this is other form of blessing here. Now I know why I've got money from this random guy in Kathgodam.
SO Pawan, his Mum, Dad and Sister - they took me along everywhere - first to hid Dad's family where I met all of them and as you can imagine - I was quite an attraction ;) They barely spoke English so I couldn't understand too much - only what Pawan translated. There was 2 Dad's brothers and 4 (?) sisters, and his Mother. She was very cute :) and a the end gave me blessings as well what was very very nice.
Basically that family is soooo much fun - they was joking and teasing each other all the time - so much of laughing. Like my family when we get together. In the meanwhile, when I couldn't understand what they were saying, I watched 2 wedding movies - of course from their family. It was so nice to see whole ceremony and recognize people who were sitting next to me. And what is very funny - to see how cheesy all those movies are made. It is unbelievable for us. In Europe - nobody would be able to accept sth like this.
Of course there was whole bunch of jokes about me and Pawan, that he has nice choice and bla bla bla ;)
Later on we went to his Mum's family as well, those people where a bit more calm, no joking that much, but very very nice as well.
All around I was basically very honored b/c I was eating with men, first, while all women were eating later and sometimes in other room or kitchen. I have got some great Indian food, some typical (some of them not necessarily very nice for me) drinks and a lot of different sweets.
That's how we spent entire day basically - visiting family and eating... I was eating half of what they were serving us but still I was fuuuuuulll... I dunno how they were able to eat all of that food - Indians have to have much bigger stomach.
Next day in Delhi - Pawan took me around, Quatab Minar (73 m-high tower of victory, built in 1193 by Qutab-ud-din Aibak immediately after the defeat of Delhi's last Hindu kingdom), Akshardham (complex dedicated to Hindu culture, music, religion, architecture), I saw a movie about 11-years old yogin Nilkanth Kalyan Yatra), 15 min boat ride through history of India.
With all respect to Indian culture and heritage, I discovered that all Indians, when they show you around, talk about something, they always emphasize - the biggest in India/world, the oldest, India was forst, India was the best etc. Sounds like there is some kind of complex and they want very badly to show off and mark India's position in the world . Anyways, some of that is true so they have right to do so. It just reminds me a bit of China and USA which want to be the best/the fastest/the biggest/ the most in general.
After Delhi - flew to Coimbatore and from there bus to Kotagiri.
First thing which I noticed - as a single traveller I attract way less attention that we used to as we were three of us. No one called me, no one wants to sell anything to me. Even though I'm in south. Well, Kotagiri is very small village, very very calm and extremely beautiful situated. 2300m above sea level, hilly, tea gardens all around, some forest, village spread all around those hills. Such a a beautiful place. There is 23 congregations all around here thus this place is calle Nilgiri's (name of the area where it is) Vatican.
I'm staying at fransiscan mission, where is formation house as well as a "house of joy" where live 9 blind girls, some of them a bit disabled, some are orphans.
It is unbelievble how happy and joyful they are,though they have some moments of sadness b/c of their hard life. But it definitely makes to think of your own life how happy and lucky you are with all what you've got.
Those blind girls are running their house completely on their own - except cooking. They clean the house every day, they clean the garden a bit, they do some knitting as their work. Furthermore b/c 15th of August is India's Independence day they are preparing some drama.
I'm taking part in all sister's prayers, sleeping a lot but helping as I can as well. I'm helping those disabled to do some manual work, helping in the around-house garden and in tea garden, reading some stories to those blind girls as they don't have too muchbooks written in Braille language.
I'm really enjoying this time here, resting a lot, thinking of my life and of myself and reading a lot - sister Katarzyna gave me nice book in polish! yay!!! :)
All sisters in this congregation are very very nice, though postulants are quite childish. it is surprising if you get to know that most of them are around my age or even older. But if you look that some of them didn't do any studies and are from small villages - it is not that surprising. Of course not all of them - some are very very nice and smart :) It would be too long to write it down (maybe one day) but from s. Katarzyna telling stories of their families I've learned quite a lot about this culture and life in India.
As I wrote, Satrurday is Independence Day and I will have to wear saree which I've got as a gift from Shweta. By accident I told sisters that I have a saree and that was my mistake. Every single sister when get to know that I will wear it starts laughing and yelling so much.. Seems once more that I will be quite an attraction for this time. Funny funny - me wearing saree with my blond, short hair and blue eyes... hahahaha.... we'll see.
Anyways, I think is time to go back home, since I already spent 1,5h in the internet cafe...
Talk to you later people!!
Ps. Oh! I forgot! One day I saw a bison - just walking around in the tea garden...
I was told sometimes they come in groups of 10-15 and walk around those tea gardens.... I think I don't want to meet any of them eye to eye ;)
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