Oliver’s 1,000,000+ Fan Club

Oliver continues to be a stud.  Honestly, I don’t know what he’ll do when we move out of this guest house.  There are approximately 15 (mostly) beautiful Indian women living here now, and they all like to flock around him and ooo and ahh and give him kisses and hold him, etc.  Seriously, what more could a little guy ask for?

As we traveled around with Mom, we were sometimes overwhelmed by people, both Indians and other foreigners, who wanted to take his picture and in some cases, hold him.  I had to become quite selective in whose requests for Oliver pictures were granted.  I imagine that thousands and thousands of people have seen pictures of Oliver.  There were days when I was so overwhelmed by being approached by nearly everybody that we saw that I just wanted to hole up and yell at everyone who looked my way.  One day I did just that—hole up, I mean, after being surrounded by a sea (seriously, a sea, like 150) teenaged students. 

While Mom was here, we visited Agra (the home of the Taj Mahal), Jaipur, and Jaisalmer.  (More about the travels soon.)  While in Jaipur, we happened across a man with a nice camera claiming to be a journalist who needed a picture for the front page of a special “Tourist-Day” edition that was going to run the next day.  I say “claiming” because I’ve had so many experiences of being fed complete sh*t.  We let him take the picture and sure enough, it was on the front page of a Hindi-language newspaper that circulates across the entire state of Rajasthan.  I think it’s safe to say that Oliver’s fan club jumped into the millions overnightJ.

Oliver has started to babble and is eating more pureed food every day.  He loves bananas, mangos, apples, pears, green beans, carrots, and peas.  Being in India has forced me to make homemade baby food since the imported Gerber’s is the only baby food available in stores, and it’s expensive.  When we were in Agra, he ate an entire mashed banana mixed with an equal portion of porridge in one sitting!  He sits up fairly well by himself, and is getting closer and closer to crawling.  He likes to spend more time on his belly, and is at the point where he scoots backward.  He loves playing with the crunchy, plastic packs of diaper wipes, my bright pink neck pillow, sheer dupattas, and books (he hits at them and chews on the cardboard ones).  One night when we were in Jaisalmer, he fell asleep playing with brightly colored, silky pillows.  What a squirt!  Enjoy the pictures of Oliver with his public…

Clothes

I’m sure you’re all curious about Indian clothing, so here’s the scoop!  The most iconic, traditional women’s clothing in India is the sari.  It’s just a short blouse (yes, midriff exposed) that clasps in the front and a long piece of fabric that is wrapped around the waist and thrown over the shoulder.  I do have a sari and I’ll put a picture up as soon as I have one of the other girls in the house show me how to wrap it; I guess it’s an intricate process.

The most popular type of outfit that Indian women wear is called a salwar kamis, casually referred to as “suits.”  It’s comprised of a tunic, pants, and a scarf (called a dupatta).  They can be very casual or very dressy.  Traditionally, the pants are very loose (this is the “salwar” style), but it’s in vogue to have tight pants (called pajama style) that scrunch up around your ankles.  Younger women will also wear regular leggings under a tunic.  Two-colored, sheer dupattas like the one I'm wearing in the picture seem to be in style.  Dupattas look pretty, but they tend to get in the way--just one more thing that can fall in the toliet.  You can buy these outfits ready-made, or buy the material and have a tailor make it for you.  Suit material is sold in pre-matched sets, so it’s easy and fun to buy since you don’t have to spend a lot of time figuring out with fabrics will match well.  It’s pretty difficult to find the tunics with real buttons (versus decorative buttons), so I’ve had them tailored with closures in the front so that I can nurse Oliver.  It’s pretty inexpensive to have custom-made clothing; I’ve found tailor close by who does a nice job and it costs between $4 and $6 to have a salwar kamis made, depending on the complexity.  It’s really fun because you can basically design your own suit by choosing the shape of the neckline, how far the back of the neckline dips on your back, if you want detailing on the tunic with fabric from the pants, etc.  Check out the picture of me in a salwar kamis with tight pants, which I call oompa-loompas.

I’ve been surprised by the number of women who wear western clothing.  About half of the women at the office wear jeans and a blouse every day.  I wish I had a pair of jeans with me.  It’s ironic that although you see midriffs of sari-wearers and salwar kamis can expose a good part of the upper back, bare legs and sometimes even shoulders will make everybody turn.  It’s a good idea to always drape a dupatta over your shirt as to not draw attention to your boobs if your shirt is relatively tight or low-cut.  I was also under the impression that saris were more commonplace, but generally I only see older women or poorer women wearing them on an everyday basis.  I’m excited to wear mine—all I need is a wedding invitation!

A Taste of Minnesota

So, dontcha know that Pradeep, my supervisor and the head of the research team at IRRAD, has planned a get-together at his apartment for this Saturday.  We decided that it would be a potluck, and you know what we Minnesotans have to bring to a potluck—BARS!  “Yes,” I exclaimed, “I will be bringing bars!  Oh, it’s been so long since I’ve had bars.  I’m so excited to bake some bars.  I’m not too fond of lemon bars, but maybe I could make Erlyce bars, which are named after an old family member who always made really good bars up at the lake, or maybe seven-layer bars, or…”  And everybody gives me this confused “huh?” type look.  “Bars?” they say.  “You mean, like granola bars?”  So the seemingly simple task of trying to explain what bars are begins.  I say, “No, well, kind of.  I mean, like brownies can be considered bars, especially if they have nuts in them, or there’s cookie bars…”  No luck yet.  “They’re about this size,” I explain as I make a bar-sized square with my hands, “and about this thick, you know, they’re bar-shaped.  But, I mean, they’re that shape because you cut them that way, so they don’t have to be exactly that size.”  Furrowed eyebrows.  “Um, they’re made in a pan, you bake them in the oven, they usually have chocolate, well except in the case of lemon bars or strawberry-rhubarb bars, and maybe butterscotch chips and definitely cookie-like crumble and probably fudge and or caramel and maybe some coconut flakes…”  And they say, “So, it’s like cake?”  “Yes, like cake but more dense and thinner…[dead silence]…I guess I’ll just have to make some bars.”  I thought about offering hotdish as well, but I think I’ll save that for the next potluck.