All in a Day's Work...or something like that...
Sometimes people ask me what I do everyday, and I have a hard time answering because everyday here is so different. I'm not a schedule freak, but having NO schedule whatsoever can get a little crazy sometimes. But it also makes for random adventures and good stories. Today is a perfect example of this:
11:00ish am Typical Saturday--I slept in, leaving my door locked so our helper wouldn't wake me up (having dusty floors is a small price to pay for sleeping in!)
12:30 pm Someone finally comes to change out the filter on our AquaGuard water filter. I think it was supposed to be done a couple months ago, but we haven't gotten sick yet (maybe we've been slowly building up a tolerance...). Anyway, he can't speak any English, and we don't know how to say 'change the filter' in Hindi, so this is a bit of a problem. We finally show him the way expired contract and he proceeds to change the filter and add some carbon powder stuff to the device (we stayed in my roomie's bedroom and just peeked out every once in a while).
2:00 pm Cleaning my room and watching ALIAS
4:00 pm Head over to the pool at the gym to meet some of our friends for swimming. It's a little chilly and the pool is in the shade, but we have a good time anyway.
7:00 pm Order dinner from Foodies 'cause we have no food in the house.
8:00 pm Food arrives, and we have only big bills and the guy has no change, so we scramble around to pay for it. The food is ok, but not incredibly exciting, so we bag up the leftovers to give away when we go out.
8:30 pm Leave to head to our landlord's new house for the blessing of the home. We stop along the way to buy them a house warming gift and this is where the real adventure begins: as we're about to enter the store, roomie points out that this crazy man we met before is right outside the store. This is not good, because he freaked us out the last time we met him, and so we duck into the Coffee Day next to the store and try to figure out what to do. Of course, we order coffee while we wait.
This was one of those moments when I think I must watch ALIAS too much. We hid out for a while, trying to keep an eye on our subject. He starts approaching Coffee Day, and we try our best to hide, but this doesn't work well when you're the only 2 white people in the room! He ends up sitting outside and so we continue to drink our coffee and strategize. We're just about to try to sneak out when he gets up and heads for the store, which is where we need to go. After waiting a bit longer, roomie heads inside to buy the present while I watch from outside and keep her posted on coms (I mean, cell phone) as to when she's clear to check out.
9:00 pm We finally hop in a rickshaw and head toward our landlord's house. We're a little concerned because 1. the rickshaw is struggling and we have to go up several hills and 2. the blessing was supposed to be around 8 pm and it's pretty late. However, we finally make it, and other people are still arriving as well.
9:30 pm The priest blesses the house and we have a tour and eat some more food (should have known not to eat dinner!)
10:30 pm After lots of visiting, some of our neighbors offer to give us a ride home
1:30 am And now, here I am, blogging 'cause I had coffee and I'm wide awake. :)