What's the fun in playin' it safe?

New fav album: Bitter:Sweet-The Mating Game. Visit pandora.com to take a listen (thanks Dhruv for this AWESOME find!)

Soft and Sultry baby! Gotta have the tension they create with the music--if I had it on a daily basis, wowza!

mmmmmm...that's what I call delicious music

Going on a date? Where to? The mall? Oh come on!

Went on a date on a Sunday night. As if the Sunday part wasn't wierd enough, he took me to the freaking mall. WTF dude? Come on! No second date there...

Explenation of my thought process:
1. Sunday date: what...I didn't make the cut for Thursday, Friday or Saturday? Red flag!
2. Taking me to the mall: Yes, there are many here. Yes, they do represent some sort of progress...but come on! This says he has absolutely no creativity, and doesn't know a damn thing about me...I even hate malls in the US.

So, yea, no second date...somehow, I think that's a really good thing!

We manage...

That was the theme when I first got to India. My roommates and I would say it over and over and laugh at things that were different, not understandable.

But I'm done with managing. I want to succeed here, I really do, but what does that fucking take? I feel like I'm at the end of my rope. managing was never a strong suit of mine. I don't manage. I either succeed or quit. But I don't manage. What's the fucking point? Do you go through the fire just to be the cliche at the end? Come on...

That which we want the most we are most afraid of

Intersting. Wonder if its true?

A template for life?

I seem to be making lots of templates lately...for events, for how to work together with other people, orgs, etc.

With this, I've been noticing that there's some sort of template that is instilled in all of us for life...what happens as time progresses. But what if we could live outside of this? I mean, what fun is there in a template? Making one, that's completely different. You create the rules by which all successive things operate. You can ensure their success just by design. you are god. Its the ultamite power trip, in a sense.

You either submit to the template, become a part of it, or you make it. But do you trust yourself enought to make it correctly? to make it successful?

3 months with a boyfriend named India...

Realization as of late: Being in a foreign country is like being in a relationship. Skeptical? Hear me out…

At first, everything is new, bright, exciting. Some things are annoying, but you overlook them in the spirit of learning. It’s just so fucking exciting! Wow, he is really smart and interesting—this is so great…wow, this place is so challenging and so different from where I am from—this is so great. Or, Wow, he eats with his mouth open—that’s so cute…wow, there are cows on the street—that’s so cute, etc.

As time goes on, the new and exciting things become routine, mundane, normal. And the annoying things become exemplified, every time you see them or experience them, its like a 12 year old playing a trumpet in your ear, signaling that something annoying is happening…even the fact that you notice it again and again gets to be annoying. Breath in and breath out. You really do like it here…you really do like this person…its just growing pains, you keep telling yourself. Because you really do want it to work.

Then, without warning, the annoying becomes normal. The trumpet gets quieter and quieter, and eventually only plays its nasty tune once in a blue moon. You find yourself more confident and able to get out there on your own, really explore—not only the markets or the curves of your lovers body, but the people, their intellect, the soul. You are able to really open up your eyes and see the country or the person you are with, for what or who they are, accept them, and then really get to know what they are about.

Funny thing is: if India was a boyfriend, I would have left him about 3 weeks ago. Maybe that's where the differences end: with a significant other, there are no guarantees. Being in a foreign country, I know the experience will make me a stronger, smarter, more aware person.

Betsy and Pinar do Delhi

A Sikh Ceremony
The largest Mosque in Delhi






Pinar arrived from NYC on Wednesday night, and today, we had the chance to see 'Old Delhi'--narrow streets, lots of shops and temples (Sikh and Jain), the Red Fort, lots of beautiful stuff, and we had a great day!

Having Pinar here has been a breath of fresh air...other than the 2 MGDs and skittles she brought me (which are freaking AWESOME), having someone around to get my jokes (and find them funny), someone that I can bug about "how is it at home", someone to chill with, has been really great! I'll miss her when she moves on to Hyderabad for APXLDS!

to resist is to piss in the wind

-Incubus

Good lyric for what I know I have to do...keep your eye on the ball...know that it is just hard now, because you are adjusting...listen to those that tell you that India is the hardest country to adapt to coming from the US...observe and don't loose yourself...learn new tacticts to get to where you want to be...

All of these are in my head...the only thing I'm scared of is that I'll return a completely different person--too harsh, too calculating, too not me...god, I'm so scared of that...

HOLI moly!

This past Sunday was (from what I can gather) the second most celebrated holiday in India: Holi--the festival of colors. People dress in raggady clothes and throw water, colors (in powder form), eggs, mud, shoe polish, basically whatever they can get their hands on, at each other.

The roomies and I woke up with no plans until we got a call from another trainee saying we had to make it into Delhi for a party at a farmhouse (no farm or animals involved--just a nice, big coutry house with a lawn). It was pretty cool. we got colorful, dirty, and tasted pong (sp?) a traditional drink with mary jane in it...only a sip did it.

The ride home was a blur, considering I concockted a pretty strong baccardi a la coke for our taste buds pleasure.

The rest of the afternoon was spent cleaning up--with 9 of us staying in the house (3 guests), followed by going to an early evening movie starring Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore. I can't believe I even went. It was one of those movies I just roll my eyes at because this is the way the rest of the world sees americans...but I won't even go there right now, enough frusturation (beacuse I can't believe I even went to it) for the moment.

En tout cas, the party was great, and I had a blast chilling out with the @ers, trainees, etc. Fun, fun, fun!

Krupp-ted

I distinctly remember a convo between the triz and I, not so long ago, about how I was going to have to join the business world, how it wasn't a bad thing. I, as usual, was a skeptic, a critic.

But, in a recent convo with my new "boss," he asked "so, what made you decide to get into business?" And all I could reply was "uhh...I didn't"

The business world tricked me into becoming part of its web. But I am enjoying it...enjoying the challenge. And things have been challenging lately. But that's good. Its always good to be reminded that there is a lot that waits ahead to learn. And this is so true in my case...a whole new world of deals and networking and meetings...the list goes on.

I'm kind of scaring myself with this realization in the turn in my attitude.