Don't Give Exchange Students Sticks They WILL Whack People!

Well out went Ganesh Fest. and in comes a new Fest, as always in the very happening and vibrant India! Right now is Noveteri (I have no idea how to spell it so, I am going to spell it various ways and probably get it all wrong, who knows?) In this holiday, there are nine nights of celebrating a goddess (don't ask me which one, but a goddess) All I know is that during this it is a sort of celebration of women and womanhood (hence you are praying to a goddess and not a god) and at the same time men are suposed to worship the women, and bow down to the ground they walk on (i only wish my brothers would embrace this holiday....) Also in this holiday, you are to Dance a lot, because apparently this is one thing women really like to do. There are a few types of dancing the first which at the beginning of the week there is Dandiya and towards the end of the week there is Garba. Two ways to throughly make a fool of myself and pretty much the entire white race.

Garba: which i have yet to experience is a dance where you dance in what ever way you would like, but to only three or four specific dance "moves" and you have several partners and you play patty cake games, in a nutshell! It is a mix between line dancing and hand jiving...

Dandiya: A dance where once again you can do whatever you want but only a few things are expected, but all you have to do is dance to the beat and beat your sticks together to the beat, and to get really snazzy, you can whack your sticks with someone elses to make even more noise and then dance around in circles... My description was one i really like, "It is like Whack-a-Mole, and Ninja fighting all in one!"

My first Dandiya: The Rotary took us to their Dandiya celebration and introduced us. Many Dandiyas are like competitions, and this one was not an exception to the rule. First there was a live band, which switched up between Classical Hindi Dandiya music and well American Rap... along with Hindi Musicals and Big Band Swing in between. It was a very diverse mix?! To say the least... But there was a practice session in which the really good people taught us white kids how to dance the Dandiya (and everyone else just laughed at us.... we are used to it). Then they opened up the floor for a real practice session (45 minutes). After this non-stop dancing, they opened up the competition rounds. Which reminded me of those old 40s-60s Dance shows, like American Bandstand, because there were roaming judges and apperentally if you began to dance poorly they would kick you off the floor (unless you where white, then they would just point and laugh). So us exchangers were pretty much really bad at it, and spent more time whacking each other with the dandiyas then actually hitting our partners sticks, and then bursting out laughing! The Indians took great pleasue in helping us try to dance, but normally it was just a big failure! That was that night, it was really a blast and all in all in the end i had a very awkward evening of trying to put two feet together and dance....

A note on the Dandiya sticks: they are normally decorated unless you pick them up at the event in that case they are going to be bamboo sticks that hurt when you get hit with them and make lots of noise when you hit them together.... But they get really nifty with them, such as i saw people who had sticks that glowed in the dark, and made great noises when you banged them together or had pretty lights that when you banged them together they made noises and lite up all at the same time!!! But my personal favorite is the fact that currently at McDonald's in India, when you buy a meal, you get a free set of decorated Dandiyas (they will probably break if you give them to any IYE kids... but still, no my little pony plastic figurine you get pretty decorated Dandiya sticks!!! How cool is that! haha)

As for me, i have a GREAT few weeks coming up!!! My friend Chloe from Racine who is living in Nagpur this year is coming to visit me in Pune, and we plan to have great fun! We are hoping to do a little site seeing in between serious shopping and meat consuming!!!! After Chloe leaves the Rotary is taking us on a trip to go to Goa and Bombay! Which is bound to be loads of fun!!! After my return is Divali and then during Divali break (which begins Nov. 3-Dec.3) I am going to go visit Chloe in Nagpur!!!! I can't wait for my adventures to begin, i will keep you all on the home front Posted!