I'm on my feet again~ I went to school on Friday and I've been playing catch up ever since. My body is completely messed up haha...it's so sad. After my fall, my neck has been hurting and I have a hard time turning my head. I've been doing twenty minute stretching exercises every day, but once I get my health back I'm going to start running like I used to. Slowly, slowly getting there~ So I have millions of photos/videos from India and I am kind of overwhelmed by the amount. I want to post everything but I think it will happen over time because school has top priority and it takes time to go through everything ~ So this is my first batch of photos!
Ahmedabad has several festivals throughout the year. While we were there, we got to participate in their kite festival which is on the 14th of January. It was an amazing experience. The whole week before the festival, the city was getting ready. Everywhere we would see people dyeing string in street corners. They dye them either a hot pink color or yellow so that it is easier to see when the kite is flying in the sky.
On the main day the entire sky was filled with kites. The ENTIRE sky. It's hard to explain, but everywhere you looked there were kites...in trees, on the street, in random corners....everywhere. It was awesome. People go up to high places...usually their rooftops and fly their kites. The majority coat their kite string or manja with powdered glass so they can take down other people's kites so we had to be careful not to get caught in a kite battle otherwise we could get hurt. I linked a wikipedia article which goes more into detail about that ~
One of the students in our group has family that lives in Gujarat and her uncle's had invited us to their home for the festival. We had a bunch of kites with us that we had bought and they had a bunch too. We climbed up to their rooftop and her cousins taught us how to fly. I wasn't that good the first time ;_____; but they told me I was learning fast yayyyy ~
Kites waiting to be flown!
Kites in the sky ~ The picture doesn't show the kites so well ;____;....it was really difficult to photograph.
Me super happy to fly a kite~
The kite flying lasted all the way till the sun went down. When the darkness fell, the fireworks and floating lanterns started filling the sky! I also have to mention that during this entire day, music was blasting from everyone's houses.....so much music and noise...it was amazing~ Some people were dancing on their rooftops...it was so cute ~
I made some "bracelets" from the extra manja ~ It stained my arm.....as of now, there is barely any color left ~
We went to a pastry shop the last day in Ahmedabad because I wanted to bring some sweets back to my family. The entire store was covered with baby kites~ Everywhere we walked, we would see kites ~ I love how the entire city embraces and participates in the festivals~
The guy on the left gave me this kites from the wall~ It now sits on my desk at home ~
Hope you guys are all well <3