Yes, I am in fact still alive!

Ever since the move to the new guest house we have been without internet. The guest house is brand new and so somewhat still under construction. All the rooms are there but things are still coming together like internet and such. They are slowly adding things day by day. This is India. I'm getting used to it.
Whenever I find myself stressed it is because I am not accepting the way things work here. I've always thought of myself as easygoing and very adaptable so it surprised me that I was struggling for the first few days, but then suddenly I realized that I really do have a western mindset. It is so much a part of me that I didn't realize that it was there. Once I gave in to India things went much better. The movie Outsourced is right, you have to stop resisting or you will hate it here. It is still a very intense country and there are times when I just am overwhelemed, but I really love it. Each experience though is very draining and I feel like over the course of time it could become difficult. I'm trying to give myself breaks because we have been on a very go-go schedule.
I operate on a very different time schedule here too. I am used to being a night-owl and staying up to obscene times of the morning but here I can barely stay awake at 10pm and I am getting up at 7-8. Morning yoga is also on the agenda once it starts up. I am looking forward to what I am calling the 'India diet' in which I walk/bike ALOT and eat less. I'm getting used to the food but I'm a little tired of spices already. We went out and got nice chinese food one day and there is some plain snack food. With my schedule I may end up forgoing lunch most days, which is fine cause I am used to skipping breakfast. They have told us the distance from the guesthouse to anything useful on campus is about 2 km or 1.5 miles, so every day I will get that walk. It's not terrible, just not what I am used to, being a lazy person and coming from a campus which is 1 block long.
There are so many things to update the blog on that I will just have to give little tidbits because I can't do everything justice. As you may have gathered, time moves at a different pace here. Nothing starts on time. We also live in a perpetual state of dust. Most buildings aren't really completely enclosed and there is just unescapable dust so I am getting used to being not totally clean all the time. Showers have been icey cold- the water in our building is 'solar' meaning its literally a tank heated by the sun. I did actually get a little hot water the other day which was soooooo nice. It's hard to really get motivated to shower when you feel like walking into an icebox. Lets see, I'm living with the other berg student, Laura. Way to go program with mixing people up. They placed a lot of people with the people from their uni though so I dunno.
Ok a few highlights. For new year's we went to a nice Indian resteraunt in Banjara hills, which is like the Beverly Hills of India. It's super nice but everything here is so cheap that it still is a pretty reasonable price. When we all came back to the guest house we went up to the roof deck and watched some fireworks. There is a little tent-village of workers behind us and we shouted happy new year across to them and were sort of shouting celebrations with them. I went right to sleep after midnight because I was so tired.
We got to go into the old city which was fantastic and completely indescribable. I am of the thought that there is NO WAY to describe India, it is just something you have to experience. I read a lot and I understand what I read and have experienced some of it, but you really can't know until you get there what it is like. Certainly this day of touring was impossible to accurately describe. We saw some really neat tombs and forts but walking through the streets was the best part for me. I will get pictures when I can. Walking through the traffic, past the vendors who are calling out to you, trying to not get run over is rediculous. Also, I love rickshaws! They are absolutely the way to travel!
Orientation is mostly over since classes will be starting, though this first week is pretty open. We have gone out in little groups to different places. We went to a really cool craft market- Shilpanara I believe is the name. We also were taken shopping for 2 sets of Indian clothes at a really nice store. Even still the prices are amazing. One top cost about 350 r which is roughly 7 dollars. There are rows and rows of colorful pants and tops and scarfs. The staff there is really great at helping you match the clothes colors. The clothes are super nice and super light weight so that even wearing long sleeves isn't too bad. The weather has been not horrible, though a bit hot. I am trying to get used to it since it will only get worse. Yesterday we met our language peer tutors and went to see the hindi remake of Momento ( Ghanjini), which was quite an experience. As someone in our group put it, that was the human experience in about 3 hours and 15 minutes. There are several bollywood dance numbers but also intense emotional scenes. It was pretty Nuts.
We had hindi today and learned the alphabet. My class is mostly going to focus on speech though, so after this week we won't use the script, just transliteration. The sounds are much harsher than sanskrit, though the letters are mostly the same. Instead of का being pronounced as kahhh, its more like kuh. Anyway, my hands are hurting and it's getting late so time to go.
I have no idea when I will update again.... just stay tuned.