Camels!

There are places in India where it feels like you are stepping back in time. Many places. Pushkar, in Rajasthan, is one of those places. And in November of each year, this sleepy town turns into a full blown circus with the annual camel fair. And yes, a camel fair is exactly what it sounds like. Thousands and thousands of camel traders bring their animals to Pushkar to sell and show off their.

It just so happened that this year, the fair fell on the same date as Thanksgiving, which means Becky and I and what seemed like a third of our AES school community hopped on a train west to take part in the festivities.

Pushkar itself is a pilgrimage sight for both Hindus and Sikhs as both Lord Brahma and Guru Nanak spent time here. So adding to the chaos of the camel fair are festivities around a Hindu celebration. In fact, the population of Pushkar goes from 15,000 to 300,000 during the fair. And it absolutely feels like 300,000 people crammed into a city built for 15,000.

The first order of business is to see the camels. We hired a camel taxi to take us on a sunset ride out to where the animals and traders were.

Nancy waiting anxiously in our carriage.

Although it would seem to be the case, we didn't ask for the most decorated camel - they all had bling.

Poop burns well.

The second order of business after getting out to the camels is to mingle. Some of our party were braver than others. 

Katrina didn't get much closer than this, unless you count riding on it's back.

Becky again managing the paradox that is both loving all animals and being skiddish of them at the same time. 

Perhaps my favorite photo set of the entire year.

After a long first day at the camel fair, there is nothing like a little chai to finish off the night. I don't know who said it first, but I've heard it from a number of people: Chai is pretty much always safe. In other words, not all street food is safe unless you really need to catch up on your bathroom magazine reading. Well, Becky and I have been putting that theory to test around India and so far so good. So when you come to visit, sound like a pro when you tell your fellow travelers, "Chai is safe, you know, cause it's boiling."

Speaking of boiling chai, this stuff was seriously hard to hold. Those are pain grins on Becky, Sharon and Nancy. 

Chai Walla

The beautiful powders were for the Hindu festival. And that is all I know.

Wow. I knew there was a reason I was putting off writing this blog post for six months. I have 350+ pictures and they are pretty much all awesome. To make this post less overwhelming (for you), I am breaking here. Part II next.

Why Becky Rocks.

#1. She encourages me to golf. Maybe she just wants me out of the house. Or, perhaps she enjoys hearing the shot by shot recap she is greeted with upon my return from 18 holes. All I know is that she has purchased several golf related gifts for me over the years. Sunday was one of those encouraging days, though not encouraging in terms of my golf game. Some boys (Kevin, Justin and Ted) and I hit Delhi Golf Club before the sweltering 115 degree heat hit.

#2. She is flexible with her plans. After golf, Becky and Kevin's wife, Tahireh, planned to make us lunch while we watched the Rangers-Tigers baseball game. (Kevin and Justin are from Michigan.)

#3. She makes me food.

#2. (continued) We finished our round a little early and were going to head over to Kevin and Tahireh's. Justin remembered that the internet was much better at my apartment and thus we would have a better game watching experience. Did Becky complain? No way, she told us to enjoy the game while she and Tahireh finished the lasagna. Wow.

#4. She is sneaky. You have to get up pretty early in the morning to surprise this guy. Well, Becky got up about three weeks early on this one. After watching the Rangers destroy the Tigers (Whoop), Kevin, Justin and I headed over to meet the ladies for a thoughtfully prepared lunch. I led the way and open the door to an apartment full of people yelling at me. This mostly confused me. And then confused me even more when they all yelled surprise again when Kevin stuck his head over my frozen shoulders. 

#5. She is really good at being excited. It didn't take me long to find Becky behind the lens of our camera  with a huge grin on her face. She kept people laughing and eating a huge spread of food the entire afternoon.

#6. She uses golf and Ranger baseball as mechanisms to get me to a surprise party. Sometimes getting people to a surprise party involves all sorts of convoluted, un-fun plans. In this case, I would have called it just about a perfect Sunday without the party!

#7. She throws a fun party. The Kevin and Isaac b-day bash was a game party. Boulderdash. Catch Phrase. Cranium. Wii Mario Kart. And my personal favorite of the day, Wii NBA Jam! 

Drew dominating Mario Kart.

Cake break between games.

#8. She supports my facial hair. Twice this year I grew a moustache. That should never happen, but she puts up with it, and that is pretty cool. The purpose of this particular stache was to support our outgoing Head of School at AES, Bob Hetzel. All the men of AES grew beards (or something resembling that in my case) and then shaved them into a moustache on the night of our annual staff farewell party. Operation Bobstaccio was a rousing success. *Reason 8 is mostly to explain why Kevin and I have moustaches in these pictures. Not that an explanation is necessary.*

#9. She had this made.

#10. She is super hot. Even though this could have been #1, it is pretty great that it didn't have to show up until #10. 

Thank you Becky and Tahireh for a great surprise party.

Fifth Annual Cutting of the Curls: The Best Yet

Previous Years Documented

First Annual Post

Second Annual Post
Third Annual Post
Fourth Annual Post

You know the routine by now.

1. I grow my hair to Texas food portion size. 
2. Offer said hair as a fundraiser for some group.
3. Let some lucky winner style it any way they choose
4. And finally pretend to be embarrassed by the extra attention. 

This year the fundraiser is very cool. Two teacher families here at school are traveling to Cambodia over spring break to build homes through The Tabitha Foundation. One of the families has two boys who were adopted from Cambodia when they we infants. What an incredible experience it will be for them. One of those boys is my student and the point guard on my basketball team. Both families are awesome and I am really happy to have helped the cause in a small way.

If you want to donate to this wonderful cause, you can do so here.

In the end, the raffle to cut my hair was won by my vice-principal - also the Mom of the two boys mentioned earlier. Teachers usually seem to be the biggest buyers for this thing which might say something about how my peers feel about me.

Eine Gute Fahrt

Well it’s been about 2 months since we were in Germany, so it’s the perfect time to start the Germany blog post!  Ich Bin immer punktlich!  That means I am always on time.  I wish I could say that we were so culturally immersed that I learned that IN germany but that would be eine Luge (a lie).  I just used google translate.  Once again, thanks google!  You really know how to make my life easier.  Of course I think google has also reduced my attention span/patience.  I also seem to have trouble focusing on one thing at a time.  I feel like there’s something I should be doing right now.  Ah yes, the blog.  

Ok here’s what we did in Deutschland:

1. Drank beer

Dad, it's your favorite!  Right where it's born!   

Isaac drank so much beer his hair tried to straighten itself....sort of.......

I'm amazed at the selection of fine biers!  Also refreshed...I think....

and ate sausage....




ok I think that just about covers it.  

hahahaaaaaaa I joke!  We probably only spent 70% of the trip drinking beer.  Seriously, the beer was so delicious.  But OTHER than drinking beer we did some other cool things like:

1. We got to wear bundle ups again and finally saw snow!  (in Austria and Switzerland in the mountains only.  The rest of the area was too warm for snow but DEFINITELY not too warm for rain.  It pretty much rained every day.)

2. We got to walk around actual cities a lot!  Delhi is many things but walkable city it ain’t.  There isn’t so much a “city” so to speak of.  It’s more like a bunch of random shop areas in different places surrounded and filled with people.  Germany was very different in that respect.  It was nice to walk around in a more organized place with about 1/20th the population of India.

Berlin

Dresden

Frankfurt

Just outside Baden Baden

Lichtenstein!  Yes, it IS a country!

3. Went to Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas Markets) A LOT!  And we didn’t buy ANYTHING there.  But we sure did enjoy the sausage and the pretty crafts and lights and stuff.   We also tried my new favorite drink to say: firezingerballer (or how it’s actually spelled: Feuerzangenbowle) But you have to yell it when you order like: FIRE ZINGER BALLLLLLLLLLLLLLERRRRRRRR!

I have to admit that it sounded cooler than it actually looked.  It’s supposed to have a suger cube SET ON FIRE and placed into the drink but we tried it in a big batch with no firey sugar cube.  It was pretty delicious. 

mmmm tastes like fire!  And zingerballer!  

This is not a FIREZINGERBALLER but it was some good sausage und bier!

4. Did the most depressing thing possible on Christmas day.  Yes, nothing celebrates the birth of Christ quite like visiting a former concentration camp.  We visited Dachau on Christmas day which was surprisingly popular on Christmas.  It was my second time there and Isaac’s first.  Definitely a somber experience and I have nothing funny to say about it so lets move on......

Work will set you free

5. Drove on the Romantic Road and it really was lovely.  Although, google maps does NOT want you to take the scenic route so we kinda missed part of the road.  At least we got to stay in the cool town of Rothernburg (not to be confused with Ranthambore in India: Home of the Tigers!  Although that is pretty cool too).   My favorite part about Rothenburg was the town clock that has a dude chugging beer.  It’s commemorating a story that the town was not sacked because they king said if he could drink a beer in one gulp that the city should be spared.  Of course NO ONE can drink a single gulp!  FALSE!  HE DID IT!   In one of the greatest drinking feats IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD, the king saved the village!  Hooray!  Today we commemorate this great leader (whose name I don’t know....probably because I drink too much beer) with the ceremonial beer bong.  We salute you sir!  

He's drinking on the right window!  

STILL drinking!  daaaaaaaang!

ahhhhhhhhh!

6. I tried skiing, and Isaac succeeded at skiing.  We have photo evidence.  I learned a valuable lesson: I can’t ski.  BUT I did try, and I sort of started getting the hang of it but I also really embarrassed myself.  I’m pretty sure I was the worst skier on the mountain.  My favorite ( most embarrassing) moment when I had a Wile Coyote moment and skied into a snow drift so that my body created a deep tunnel like......

only with skis and snow.  The worst was I totally had to do the walk of shame down some steep parts of the mountain while 4 year olds (no exaggeration) were shushing past.  I’m pretty sure that’s the technical ski term.  

Of course Isaac was amazing at skiing and was doing jumps while I was struggling to survive.  It was fun.  

This is BEFORE I tried to ski.  You can almost see my naiveté although it's blocked by my $30 sunglasses.    

7. We ventured into Prague and despite NOT drinking Absynth, had a great (not halucinatory) experience.  See pics below.  

They're trying to save a swan. 

8. We experienced a crazy New Year's Eve. Apparently, in Germany people can buy big fireworks and set them off wherever they want in Germany (and other parts of Europe too, I'm told). Well we experienced this in full force smack dab in the middle of Berlin. We even got hit by firework debris. It was awesome/scary. I don't know if Americans could handle this kind of freedom but Germans sure did seem to love it!  

Ok since I’ve been writing for about 20 minutes my focus is gone.  Thanks again google!  I hope you’ve all enjoyed! Questions and comments go in the same place they usually do. Wait, the comments usually stay in your head, which is why we don't blog more, because we think you don't love us, so fix that and write a comment about how inappropriate it is for teachers to be in the same pictures as beer. It was Germany!

Love,
   Becksac