real adults.

Living on a mountain side, with limited contact to the outside world, it is sometimes very easy to loose perspective and forget that you are supposed to act like a 'real adult'...lately, we have been making it a goal in our day to day lives to be as adult as possible.. little goals like: don't go into bed before 8 pm(this is very hard to do when it's freezing everywhere else in the house), eat real meals.. cheese and crackers does NOT qualify as a meal, shower at least twice a week (once we master this goal, we might consider uping the ante to three times..) do our laundry every so often; at least the long underwear layers we wear everyday, make it to Hindi lessons on a regular basis, scavenge wood for the fire, little things of the sort..
I know that my life is quite unusual compared to the 'average' 23 year old's...sometimes, I forget this bit of knowledge; while other times, it seems to be screaming in my face. This past weekend is a prime example of oddities screaming in my face. It all started when I spent my Friday night chugging cup after cup of.. hot tang with 60 eighth graders at my house...
It continued on into Saturday when Nan and I ventured into Dehradun to shop for household goods like real adults. the only problem is, you have to walk everywhere. Now Nan and i already stand out due to our white skin and the fact that we are significantly taller than everyone else in India. But by the end of our trip, we were a total shit show..picture two white girls in an extremely chaotic indian city, trying to cross the street eight different times carrying a bookshelf, 4 large baskets, 7 bags and 9 large posters while simulataneously trying to eat the best toffee in the world which was purchased at a run down hotel's front desk- the name of the hotel and toffee...KWALITY (yes, as in quality with a kw). luckily, we made it back up the mountain in one piece and sadly, there is no photographic evidence. however, i would like to share with you the posters we accumulated..words can not describe just how wonderful and hilarious these really are...we are thinking of putting an art gallery of them in our house...kind of like something real, mature adults would do....right?!

Can someone please tell me what that bird like monster is?

That night, our friend Paul had a raging party at his place, on our way there, we heard a very strange noise coming from the woods. I mentioned it sounded odd and Lauren and Nan told me to not worry about it, that it was just a baby monkey. after arriving at Pauls, we got a phone call from the principal of the school saying not to go anywhere, there were leopards all around campus, including outside of his home, the house we were walking past when we heard the 'baby monkey'. that's the last time i listen to Nan and Lauren. Anyway, where i was going with the story of the party is that, unlike real adults, who dress up and put effort into going out, we wore our typical 5 layers, hats, gloves and the like...
Sunday was filled with big ambitions- while most 23 year olds spend majority of sunday morning sleeping off saturday night,we had climbed a mountain for our favorite french toast, ate breakfast, gone grocery shopping, had a potentially dangerous interaction with mules, and
all by 11 am. we returned home to chop wood for a few hours, taking turns with the ax and cheering one another on. a pretty typical afternoon.


tonight we cooked. a lot. it made quite the mess. but, like real adults, we have to eat. unlike real adults, we pay about forty dollars a month to have our ayah, Saroj clean everyday. so this mess, tomorrow when we come home exhausted from school, will be gone. tough life.
psh. real adults? ..who are we kidding?