in the last two to three weeks, the following series of events has occurred. I:
1) have discussed salvaging an ex-relationship with my ex-swedish boyfriend;
2) had a malaria scare, in which my health insurance did not cover the hospital bill;
3) have fallen down a marble staircase at mahim station, badly bruising my a** and probably nearly breaking my arm;
4) have left my bloody wallet filled with cash and credit/ATM cards in the back of a taxi, which was never brought back or turned in to the u.s. consolate;
5) have been exhausted from running on very little sleep each night;
6) have been ill with a cold-cum-sinus infection as a result;
7) have given up on the tata indicom corporation for its ridiculous customer service to fix my internet connection
8) was offered the possibility of a promotion which was then retracted;
9) was very possibly nearly a victim of the terrorist attacks on mumbai;
10)am having a career crisis in which my current job is unsatisfactory and does not match its posted job role expectations for which i accepted the position;
11) currently have another job offer which i need to accept by tuesday.
i'm not complaining but just saying life has been a bit rough for the last 2-3 weeks and is the reason i have not had time (or energy) to post anything here. jag måste ha att göra med stora högar skit. so i'm looking forward to tomorrow and a new week: hopefully terrorist-free and filled with some major positive changes.
in addition to the above, my little pentax camera is currently not corresponding with my computer, so i cannot post photos from the GOOD things that i think have occurred in the last two weeks... so i will post a couple of shots here, which are from the past or which i've dragged off my friend's picasa album:
i attended the most fabulous wedding, ever, i think...or at least it ties for first place with my friends' japanese/english wedding in sintra, portugal.
as you can see in the pic (click to enlarge if you wish) i'm wearing a sari which was tailor made and bought for me by my friend shailaja ...the bride in the pic below. the wedding involved a weekend getaway to a fabulous resort up north; nights spent at hotels in colaba with a group of friends; endless amounts of amazing indian food in the form of several days of brunching, dining, drinking, and a bbq-ing on the beach in murud. we girls also got mehndi designed on our hands at a friday night cocktail party (before the festivities began) at shai's parents' place. needless to say, fabulous is an understatement.
in other news, i made my début in bollywood as an extra in the film, yuvvrajj ('crowned prince' in hindi). apparently it's bombed at the box office but i have been spotted by students, colleagues and friends in at least three spots at the credit run. so i will hit the cinema later this week with some fellow western co-stars to take in the great horrors and pageantry of the bollywood technique. fun times!
one night early in the month, my roommate annika, our friend alan and i walked into a cafe and discovered that we had won 300 rupees (about $6 or 42SEK) worth of food, coffee, and anything we wanted at the counter. why? my roommate was wearing a purple scarf and was the first person to wear the "lucky color" accessory that day. we won a big bag, filled with boxes and boxes and BOXES of stuff: breads, cakes, desserts, cookies, etc in addition to the drinks we'd ordered. we were distributing it to squatters on the streets of mumbai from the rickshaw and on the walk home, feeling much like the santa claus of the south. in the pic is annika, alan and the owner of candie's (the little cafe up in bandra):
here are some long exposure shots from a breezy early november evening at a drive-through street kitchen in colaba. two friends and i had gone there for dinner...quite amazingly, i've yet to fall ill from eating at any street kitchen.
last weekend, it was actually at this famous and patented place that my dear parsi friend actually tricked two friends and me into eating a delicious dish (which, from the texture, i'd guessed was mozzarella or cottage cheese sauteed and served in a sauce). I found out afterwards that i'd consumed the brains of a billy goat. i was half disgusted, half amused at my friend's clever technique of "order and devour," in which my other two friends and i hadn't known what each dish was until after we'd finished it (since he'd ordered in hindi). very funny...still laughing about that classic and horrific moment of realization.
