The Adventures of April and May...

*My name is April and Beki’s middle name is May…
the people here get a kick out of that one……..
So in America we say we need to run a few errands and we run out the door with our list of 20 things and can get most if not all of them done. Funny thing about some cultures… if we get 2 things off our list done in one day we feel as productive as if we’d accomplished all 20.
So we began our day with the usual 30 minute walk from our village to town after we met with our landlord who kindly introduced us to his tailor friend. She was wonderful… the plan was to go with her to the material shop and pickout curtains for our house. Afterwards we would go pick a few paint colors and tada! We should be done… We are so silly sometimes…. Well we made it to the tailor, said hello, after which it starts pouring rain outside. So one cup of chai and 3 hours later the rain stops and we head over to the material shop.
*Culture lesson: We have learned that in this culture you pick out one color of paint and one kind of curtain. So expressing in part Hindi part English that we wanted 4 different color curtains was a difficult thing for them to grasp. We have also learned that if you ask a nationals opinion about a color and they don’t like it – probably anyone from the western world would love it. So one hour, our second cup of chai, and 500 rolls of material later… we pick our curtains and hand them over to the tailor.
Then begins the search for suit material in of which the electricity goes out… Now I don’t know about you but I have never gone clothes shopping in the dark but evidently it doesn’t phase the people here. So I’m not Really sure what color my suit is exactly or what it will look like but it will be fun to find out when I get it back.
It’s about 5pm when we start on errand number two… we meet up with our landlord who goes with us to the (HA) “Sherwin Williams” of Nimda so we don’t get ripped off…pesky white tax as we call it. (the lighter your skin the higher the price). Ya know how its fashionable to pick a bold or bright color and paint like one or 2 walls of a room? (called accent walls) HAHa yeah try explaining that to 5 nationals who are looking at you like you are crazy… then explain it to the painters about not painting the entire room the same color. So if you have ever heard of Brian Regan the comedian… it sounded something like his doughnut routine… “ALRIGHT… I want a doughnut...with icing ALL over it and I want sprinkles but NOT all over it…”
So as we are walking back finally to our house we are stopped and given yet a 3rd cup of chai and chat with a family we have become friends with. So half an hour later we escape to make it back up the hill to meet our landlord and tell him which colors we want where so he can tell the painters…SO tired!