As you may remember from my last entry, I left bright and early Saturday morning. I flew into Munich, where I had a seven hour layover. So I made good use of that time and took the train into the city where I explored. I went into the town square and walked around, saw the town hall where the clock chimes every hour and little figure dance around, and saw a really old church. After Munich, I headed to Dubai, where I stayed for about five hours (in the airport, since it was like 2:00 AM). Then on to Delhi for another five hours, and finally to Kolkata late Sunday night! 
I got picked up by a couple from the SDA church I met the last time I was there, and we headed to a nice guest house to check me in before going out to dinner. I crashed that night and had a leisurely morning the next day before meeting with Maitrayee, the lawyer I met on my last visit and who I’ve continued to work with both personally and through our Walla Walla Amnesty Club. She took me out shopping, bought me clothes and souvenirs and such, and then we met up with one of her friends and went by the river and walked around, went to a really cool memorial for a guy who made the first mint, bridge, map of the city, and some other stuff. After which, we headed to dinner to meet the other organizers of LEAP, the legal awareness camp that Amnesty funded. They were a fun group of people; we started dinner at 7:00 PM and didn’t get done till around 11:00.
The next day was Diwali! For those who don’t know, Diwali is like the biggest Hindu festival all year, kind of like their Christmas. For me it was like Christmas (tons of lights everywhere), New Years (fireworks, all night, for like 4 days), and Thanksgiving (so so much food) all rolled into one. So, one of the people I met at dinner that night, Anju, invited me over to her house for the day. So I went there and met her husband and two sons, who are about my age (16 & 18). So we had a good time together and let me tell you, throughout this whole trip I experienced Indian hospitality to the MAX. Apparently help is quite cheap there, so Anju has someone who does some of her cooking and cleaning, and someone who comes and gives massages. She just happen to come the day I was there, so I got to experience her lovely services, and were they lovely. Afterwards, we got all decked out for Diwali, sari, bindis, the works. Then we had dinner, and then they did their puja. Puja is the name for the Hindus worship services. Some of the devout Hindus do Puja every day, but practically all do it on festival days like Diwali. They invited me to participate, but as enthusiastic as I was about
getting cultural experience, this was a little bit much for me so I kindly declined and said I would just watch. They did a lot of what sounded like chanting to me, but was praying for them, and they offered food and money to statues of their gods, and burned oil in front of them… Very interesting to watch. Interesting to note, they believe in one God , like Christians, but just worship different representations of him.
I got picked up by a couple from the SDA church I met the last time I was there, and we headed to a nice guest house to check me in before going out to dinner. I crashed that night and had a leisurely morning the next day before meeting with Maitrayee, the lawyer I met on my last visit and who I’ve continued to work with both personally and through our Walla Walla Amnesty Club. She took me out shopping, bought me clothes and souvenirs and such, and then we met up with one of her friends and went by the river and walked around, went to a really cool memorial for a guy who made the first mint, bridge, map of the city, and some other stuff. After which, we headed to dinner to meet the other organizers of LEAP, the legal awareness camp that Amnesty funded. They were a fun group of people; we started dinner at 7:00 PM and didn’t get done till around 11:00.
The next day was Diwali! For those who don’t know, Diwali is like the biggest Hindu festival all year, kind of like their Christmas. For me it was like Christmas (tons of lights everywhere), New Years (fireworks, all night, for like 4 days), and Thanksgiving (so so much food) all rolled into one. So, one of the people I met at dinner that night, Anju, invited me over to her house for the day. So I went there and met her husband and two sons, who are about my age (16 & 18). So we had a good time together and let me tell you, throughout this whole trip I experienced Indian hospitality to the MAX. Apparently help is quite cheap there, so Anju has someone who does some of her cooking and cleaning, and someone who comes and gives massages. She just happen to come the day I was there, so I got to experience her lovely services, and were they lovely. Afterwards, we got all decked out for Diwali, sari, bindis, the works. Then we had dinner, and then they did their puja. Puja is the name for the Hindus worship services. Some of the devout Hindus do Puja every day, but practically all do it on festival days like Diwali. They invited me to participate, but as enthusiastic as I was about
getting cultural experience, this was a little bit much for me so I kindly declined and said I would just watch. They did a lot of what sounded like chanting to me, but was praying for them, and they offered food and money to statues of their gods, and burned oil in front of them… Very interesting to watch. Interesting to note, they believe in one God , like Christians, but just worship different representations of him.
After puja, we went to several of their relatives houses for a quick hello before heading to Maitrayee’s apartment. We had chai (and more food) there, and stayed and talked a while, and then at about 1:00 AM we decided to go for a drive. So we went for a drive and then headed back to Anju’s apartment for more chair and games. We played a game called Flash kind of like our version of poker but simpler; it was a lot of fun and we played till about 4:00 AM. After Flash we went onto the roof and shot off fireworks and I finally got to bed around 7:00 AM. What fun Diwali is!
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