On Wednesday, we walked around the town a bit and saw yet another festival. It’s like they have them every day here! From what I could gather, this was to celebrate the birth (I think “Jayanti” means “Birthday”) of the historical figure Shivaji Raje Bhosle who laid the foundations of the Maratha Empire, which I think Mumbai (where we are now) was part of. Shivaji was a Hindu, but he was respectful of other religions and was an all around cool guy (he opposed the prevailing practices of treating women as war booty, destruction of other religion’s monuments, slavery, and forced religious conversions) so his birthday is celebrated by pretty much everyone in India.

Buuuut, it seems there’s a bit of controversy about when exactly his birthday is. There used to be a bunch of different birth-dates observed so after 34 years (!) of deliberation and research, everyone more or less compromised and said it’s on February 19. Or, almost everyone. The Shiv Sena, a far-right Hindu nationalist party, insisted that his birthday be celebrated according to the Hindu calendar, which this year was on March 3.

Wow, and I thought American politics was complicated. But really, I think it’s just an excuse to throw another big party. Oh, also, they were passing out cakes with a yogurt topping on it and they were really yummy.

Monday was the second day of Holi and that’s when the colors come out in earnest. Also, the water balloons. I think there was a water component to the original festivals but now I think it’s just an excuse to have a giant water balloon fight. The water also makes the dyes stick more. Oh, the colors also apparently have meaning:

• Red is for Prosperity
• Green is for Happiness
• Blue is for Sensitivity
• Orange is for Progress
• Pink is for Friendship

We’re still in Mumbai so we happen to still be in India during Holi, the spring Festival of Colors celebrated throughout India and several other parts of the world with large Indian populations. I was fortunate enough to have one of the guys at the front desk of our hotel offer to show me around for the festival. Here in Mumbai it’s a two day celebration and the first day (held on Sunday this year) was marked by burning of bonfires. The act symbolizes the burning away of all the bad luck from the previous year.

The atmosphere is a little like Halloween where lots of people are hanging out at night and having fun. But instead of trick or treating, neighbors check out the different bonfires and they start “playing” colors. What’s that? It’s where friends will tag each other with different colors of powdered dyes. But the colors don’t really get going until the second day…

Seeing the aforementioned cow hanging out in the street is a big reminder that yes, this is indeed a foreign country. But even here in Mumbai, India, they still have McDonalds (no beef items, but you can get a “Chicken Maharaja Mac meal for 124 Rupees or about $2.68). And then I saw a cake decorated with characters from Pixar’s Cars. I guess it really is the age of the global economy…

I love Indian food and in the Bay Area, we’re fortunate to have a wonderful selection of it. But in India, it’s even better. And it’s not just the Indian food, even Chinese take out tastes great, although it does have a distinctly Indian flavor to it. And the desserts? Soooo good…

This article illustrates exactly the sort of dangers there are in detailing your travel plans or even personal information (like your birthday) in a public place. Fortunately, we’ve got a house sitter the entire time we’re in India and vigilant neighbors who are also retirees with nothing better to do than watch our house. Not to mention our three vicious guard cats. They will scratch you to death if you look at them funny. Also, we have a pit bull … he’s totally got rabies, too. And a komodo dragon. Their bites are toxic to humans.

For some reason, I can’t get to Google from here in India. I’m assuming it’s just a local problem. I mean, Google’s not really down or anything, right? That just seems too wild of a possibility to even seriously consider. In the meantime, I’m using … <shudder> … Bing.

Mumbai is a amazing mix of elements: rural and urban, natural and developed, East and West, often in the same block. Seeing the auto-rickshaws drive by this Gold’s Gym in the middle of a densely set of trees really brought that all home to me. A couple blocks away, there was a cow hanging out in front of a flower store.

Hey, we’re back in India! We sporadically have an internet connection at the place we’re staying but it’s not very consistent. On the plus side, the weather’s pretty nice in Mumbai. At least it was at 4am…

Last minute checklist:

• House sitting arranged? Check.
• Baby furniture acquired? Check.
• Baby clothes and diapers ready? Check.
• Camera? Check.
• Blog posts pre-written and scheduled to run during the inevitable crazy period where I won’t be able to write for a while? Wait, what? Uh, oh…