Almost every one of my latest entries here starts with “I haven’t written here for a while” or something like that. Well this one is no exception. A lot has happened since my last entry and it’s a shame I’m writing only now.

An important event was my hospitalization. After spending the night of Saturday the 1st of December in my toilet (not going into details) I was rather seriously de-hydrated. In fact, so seriously that I ended up, collapsing on my bedroom floor. I was rather scared and so was my host-family. Since the doctors don’t make house- calls, Sukhbir had to drive me to the hospital. The first place we went to had no doctors (of course there weren’t, it was Sunday after all). Therefore we had to drive in to the city centre, to the Guru Nanak Mission Hospital. I nearly fainted on my way there and in overall felt like dying, my vision was yellow and everything I heard, sounded distant (or like being in a large room, like a Church or something). When I told this to Sukhbir, his only reply was: “C’mon don’t be such a sissy”. I’m glad that I didn’t have the energy to punch him in the face because I swear, If I could have done it, I most certainly would have.The Guru Nanak Hospital had doctors and they admitted me instantly. I was attached to a dropper almost instantly and started getting minerals. I was (almost) asleep most of the day and by the evening was recovered enough to stand up. The detached the dropper for the night and I slept well. By Monday morning I felt great already and could go home. I didn’t go to school on the next day because I thought it might be a good idea to gain a little more strength.

I think the worst effect of this illness was that I have to fight with my host-mom every day. She thinks that my illness was caused by cold and tries to make me wear thermals and a winter hat (just like Sukhbir does). I can no longer take cold showers or wear T-shirts in the house, otherwise I’ll be scolded. In addition to that, every morning I have to wear my leather jacket on top of my school uniform. As if that wasn’t enough, Harleen has been trying to tell me that it is awfully bad for my health to take a shower in the evening. This exaggerated fear of cold is really getting on my nerves and I’m trying to avoid her presence as much as possible and hope that one day she will listen to me (for a change).


Last Sunday we went to see our relatives who live in a village nearby. It was great. Their house is nicer than ours and they have a lot of trees in the garden (I miss trees a lot since Punjab only has fields). We ate saag (spinach ), cooked on fire and sat outside the whole time. I truly enjoyed myself and plan to take their offer and go there for a weekend or so. I’d like to go on 13th of March when they gather wheat. It is a big festival for the “desis” (locals, rural people) and would be a great opportunity to see a festival celebrated in a village. Unfortunately our YFU Gangotri trip will be at about the same time.


There’s some new information on our social work. We won’t be quitting DPS after all and the social work will be just an after-school activity. Instead, DPS management (which has started to worry about us, not enjoying our school) has offered to “pack” our schedule which means that we got to choose whatever subjects we would like to study. This is great and I’m looking forward to the change.