This past Monday, August 7, was Raksha Bandhan. We do not have this holiday in the US, but after experiencing it for the first time in India, I am not sure why not! Raksha Bandhan is a holiday celebrating the bond and relationship between brother (or a brother-like figure) and sister. Physically, the sister gives the brother a gift of sweets and ties a Rakhi (bracelet) around his wrist. There is a small ceremony (I wouldn’t even call it a ceremony but I can’t think of a better word) where the sister will sit or stand by the brother and put a mark on her brother’s forehead (again not sure what it is called, it’s like a bindi but on a guy) and puts rice on the mark before it has a chance to dry. Then, she feeds him sweets like raisins, nuts and chocolate and ties the rakhi onto his wrist. In return, the brother will give a small gift to his sister. I went through this process with my (host) brother Gatik. Gatik is quite the character and definitely gets himself in more trouble than I care to describe but he is my brother and I love him. I cannot imagine life without him and I am dreading the day I have to say goodbye to him when I leave this host family or when I go back to the states. This whole exchange only took a matter of 10 minutes and we had the entire day off from school for the holiday so my host family took full advantage. Actually the night before on Sunday we traveled to my host mom’s mom’s house (my host grandma’s house). We stopped at McDonalds for dinner at 11:30pm and I had THREE veg pizza McPuffs. In my opinion, the USA McDonalds should adopt this food. It may be vegetarian but it is also very delicious. We got to the house at about midnight and I greeted my host grandma and uncle before heading off to bed. I slept in until about 9am and stayed in bed until 9:45am on Monday (Raksha Bandhan) because I went to bed late and was exhausted. I got ready for the day and the maid cooked me a breakfast of salted prantha with butter and some sort of daal and pickle to eat it with. I personally did not like the pickle but the daal and prantha was nice. (Daal is like lentils kind of. They are usually quite soft and soupy but at least in my host family it is VERY popular to make). After Monisha was finally ready (she could probably sleep until 4pm if you let her), she took me to her friend, Aryan’s house. He was very nice and I think it was a nice chance for him to spend time with Monisha and Gatik since they live quite a distance from each other. After visiting for a little while, we left and went to my host mom’s sister’s house. She lives less than 10 minutes from where we were staying. We spent a few hours here and I mostly hung out with the kids who were flaunting their baskets of sweets around that their sisters had given to them for the holiday. Once we made our way back to my host grandma’s house along with some guests from my host aunt’s house we watched some TV together and rested until it was around 4pm and time for us to leave. Everyone said their goodbyes and we were on our way. It takes about an hour and a half to get home but I didn’t get back until around 7:30pm because we indirectly went home much to my surprise. First we dropped off Monisha at tutions and then drove to a nearby house where which is being built by my host father’s construction company. It is really neat to see how houses are built in India because it is completely different than the US. They use a metal frame and surround it with bricks and then use cement to make a smooth surface. There’s no insulation used in the walls and the only wood that is used in the construction is in the window frames. I personally just enjoy the fact that the rooftops are all flat so you can walk around on them. I try to go on the rooftop terrace of my host family’s house every evening when I am not too busy. It is a good stress-reducer and I enjoy taking in the sights of evening activities like kite flying and bustling traffic. After stopping at the construction sight we picked up Monisha and stopped on the way home to get some roasted corn on the cobs (the same food I got my very first day with my host family). I was thankful to finally get home and I took a shower, submitted my position paper for MUN (the next post will tell you all about my first experience in an MUN conference), and went to bed.
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AuthorNamaste! Mera naam Anna hai! Hi! my name is Anna. Please enjoy reading about my experience as a high school junior in India and ask any questions you may have! Archives
June 2019
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