16 Sept (busy week)

In my last post I wrote that I was accepted in to the school basketball team. Well, basketball practices were the events which filled every day of my previous week. We had practices in the morning (basically a couple of hours from the school time) and evening…every day. On last Sunday I had my first match. It was great, we practically killed the other team despite the fact that they had a lot of tall players. I suppose, height isn’t everything. However, it was just a practice match for the upcoming tournament on the next Friday-Saturday (which was yesterday). The tournament was held in a place called Nawan Shahar (navan sheher) in a boarding school. The school campus and the sports section were magnificent. The campus had an amazingly beautiful temple complex, which by its structure reminded me the Golden Temple. there was some hall (which was under construction) in the center and it was surrounded by water and separate temples for Sikhs and Muslim and Hindus (Gurdwara, Mosque and Temple, respectively). The only thing that got me wondering, was why would someone build something so beautiful for a boarding school in the middle of nowhere, in fact I even wonder, why would someone build such a state of the art school in the midst of fields.

In any case, the tournament was quite well organized and important. It even had TV coverage. We won 4 games out of 5 and came third in overall. We should have come at least second, because the team which we played in the semi-finals had collage students in it and that was illegal, but no-one cared about our complaints and they got their victory. I played with a jersey which had Yogesh written on it, because Yogesh was kicked out because of me and they couldn’t get a new jersey with one week. This caused me some trouble because a lot of people thought that I was Indian. The tournament was fun and I even got a nice tan. The sun has come out and every day is like the most beautiful Estonian summer day.
During the ending ceremony, when Bhangra dancers performed, all the teams joined them on the court and so did we. This was the first time I ever danced Bhangra (or something like that) and it felt great.
When I arrived yesterday (at 12.30 in the evening), I found a nice surprise: Sukhbir and Harleen had re-arranged my room. I now have a table and 4 chairs, a night lamp, an extra closet for my clothes and a lot of free space, since an entire section of my room was freed due to the removal of unnecessary furniture which was kept there earlier. The best thing, however, is that all the annoying pictures of my little brother are gone and replaced with pictures of gurus, Harimandir Sahib and a painting. I truly like it, my room feels so much bigger and at the same time, cozier.

Today, I went to a birthday party of three girls (three friends who happen to be born exactly on the same day and same year and go to the same class). I was a bit confused because I had no idea what to give them (who knows, what is and what is inappropriate here in India) and there was no-one to help me. The only thing, my host mother told me was that I can get all my gifts from a particular shop in Model Town. Therefore, I headed out for Model Town, where I found the shop as well as many others, closed. I had forgotten that the life there starts in the evening. However, I couldn’t wait until evening and had to improvise. I went to the best bakery shop in the city and bought three chocolate cakes.

Just as I reached home with my cakes, Sanchit, my friend, called that since they (he and Mantej) were in the area, they were going to pick me up early (about 3 hours earlier than they were supposed to) and that I can take my stuff and get ready at Sanchit’s place. That is exactly which I did. I even had a shower at his place. I couldn’t think of doing something like that in Estonia, but here it is completely normal, Indians’ attitude to homes is somewhat like “my home is yours” and that is literally how it works. I can feel myself totally home in my friends’ homes.

To get back to the topic, before we went to the party, we went to a florist and got some beautiful flowers for the girls.
The party started at 3 o’clock and ended at 7 o’clock. At first I was kind of critical about the length of the party but then remembered that this is India and this means no alcohol. It was very refreshing to find that Indians (and even me) can have fun without alcohol. We danced for almost all the time (the sound system was great). This was not the kind of dancing as we have in Estonia and I learned some nice moves.
I remember reading from Siim’s blog that he went to a birthday where there were only boys. Well I have to say that over half of the guests at the party today were girls. I suppose, it has to do with the type of people you hang out with, because I know that there are such kind of guys here who don’t talk to girls very much and even look down upon them. I’m glad to announce that it is not this way with my friends.


That’s about it,
Happy birthday, Gunjan, Garima and Additi !!!!!!