April 7-12 School Vacation Part 1

On "election for prime minister break" we went to the park and saw a few piglets and this is a video of the piglets.

Later that morning we went to Connaught Place to buy books for me in the Jain Book Depot. In Connaught Place we went to Cafe Coffee Day. This is me making a "cool dude" face with my Angry Bird shirt in Cafe Coffee Day.

On the way to the metro later that day, we saw a truck carrying two bulls. I got a picture of their backsides.

This is Bhutti cha-cha, my dad's cousin-brother and me. Cha-cha means uncle. We're on our way to India Gate.

At India Gate, we saw a bunch of street sellers . One of them was selling paan, which is the Hindi word for betel leaf. I had a piece, which was sweet. It had cherries, betel leaf and other spices wrapped in a leaf. You chew it for a long time and spit out the juice.

This is me at India Gate, standing in front of it. It's right next to me on the right side.

This is mommy and Bhutti Cha-cha standing in front of India Gate, with crowds of people behind them.

This is the inside of India Gate. There is also an eternal flame there to remember soldiers who died in the World War.

This is Dadaji, my grandfather.

This is Dadaji showing me the special way to write Hindi letters.

This is me and Kullu on our bed resting after playing awhile.

This is the Pacific Mall, which is covered with many colored flags. The mall is near our house.

On Wednesday, we went to my violin lesson at Jugalbandi, which is a music and dance school.

This is me with my new teacher playing Sargam, which is the Indian Do Re Mi. The Indian way is Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Dha Ni Sa.

I sit half criss-cross with my left leg under my right knee, and my right leg a little forward so I can rest my violin scroll on my heel.

These are my friends that I play with every night. This boy's name is Suraj.

This girl's name is Tanushi.

 The girl in the red and gold dress on the left is Pratchi, and the girl on the right of Pratchi is Preesha. The boy that is right above Tanushi is Ayush. You probably remember him from Ayush's birthday.

This is Ayush and Suraj making funny faces.

This is Preesha, Pratchi, and Tanushi having a picture together.

This is Pappu Cha-cha, Bhutti's brother, who is working at the election for the Prime Minister of India.

April 1-5 - Inside My School

This is Joe at the airport on April 1st. He's leaving and after he was boarding the plane, we found out that he missed the plane. April Fools! He got the plane, and I wanted to say to you, Happy (late) April Fools Day!

This is me walking to school wearing my second uniform, which is red for Gandhi House, which is the color group that I'm in. The whole school is divided into four colors, green, yellow, blue and red. Each color has a house name. I know the red, because it's my color, and it stands for Gandhi House. The other houses are Tagore House, Nehru House, and Theresa House named after Mother Theresa.

This is a boy from Gandhi House playing the keyboard for the national anthem, the school anthem, and a religious song that we sing every morning at assembly.

These multicolored shirts represent the four houses. Every one stands in rows in front of their teacher. Boys and girls are in separate lines. Here we are in our class rows so we're all mixed up. Sometimes we stand with our houses.

This is one of the fourth grade classes having dance class. The boys are dancing while the girls are talking. The dance teacher, Mausami ma'am, has a dance room, but it is being fixed so we have to have dance class in our classrooms for now.

This is my homeroom, 4F. I am in the back corner, with my left hand up facing the camera. There are 47 kids in my class. I've made some friends, and some of them are in this picture. The boy on the left facing the camera is Avneesh, and the girl next to him with glasses also facing the camera, smiling, is the girl that called me cute on the first day. Her name is Sanvi.

This is the bulletin board for Gandhi House. It says "Gandhi House: Hard Work for Success" and under it are some drawings and words to achieve these goals.

These are two more posters on the Gandhi House bulletin board. This says "Working hard is important, but there is something that matters even more - Believing in Yourself - Harry Potter"

This one says "A beautiful life does not just happen, it is built by prayer, humility, sacrifice and hardwork.

This is me on the field during play time playing dodge ball. Dodge ball is different in India. Boys or girls stand around in a circle and then somebody picks a few boys to be in the middle. If you have the ball, you have to throw it at one of the kids in the middle of the circle, and it has to hit them below the waist.

This is an organized assembly of Gandhi house students. We're wearing only red and we're in rows, so it's more organized than the multicolored rows.

These are the four houses on the assembly field. One is green, one is yellow, one is red, and one is blue. Everyone is finished with assembly and waiting their turn to leave to their classrooms. After assembly a bell rings, and it's "0" period. We have 8 periods in a day. The subject teachers change classes and come to our room. We stay in the same room all day. During 0 period, we sit around the class talking and chatting with our home teacher. On the other hand, I'm going to the music room during 0 period because I was picked for a special chorus to sing for the birthday of the Director of the school in May.

This is me in the special chorus. I'm in red on the left, a little far away from a guy in blue, with my notepad and crayon box on top of each other, and I'm facing the teacher.

In the far right corner, the music teacher, Steve, is playing a guitar to a song we're singing called "The Days of Elijiah"

After school, I took a picture of one of the pages in my Hindi notebook, and this is what it looks like.

March 30th Part 2 - Jantar Mantar

After the Lotus Temple, we went to Jantar Mantar. Jantar Mantar is an astrological site with big structures used to measure the planets and stars. On the way in, we saw a lot of pictures of planets but mostly of the moon, kind of making fun of the moon. Here are some of them with the moon as a light,

.,.in a picture frame

...being lassoed

... being held

...and being trimmed

This is me standing on some of the structures used to measure stars and planets.

This is me in front of a light spiral of stars photo with small bars, and my head looks like it's attached to the middle bar connecting to the inner circle.

This is mommy holding a star on one of the pictures in Jantar Mantar.

Later that day, some relatives came to visit. This is Cochi, the son of Mona, one of my cousins. He's 13 months old.

Later, we also went to Connaught Place and mommy got me some new sun glasses. This is me standing in front of a clothing shop with my sun glasses.