There are a few other general topics I wanted to talk about...but I forgot them by the time I got back to this. When they come up I'll write it up. Until then here is how the rest of my freetime went:
Week 3- July 9th (thursday night) I flew out to North Carolina for my aunt/uncle as well as parents 25th anniversary celebration and my cousin's (Anusha, 16) arengatrum- dance graduation. I'll give you a quick run through of what happened. Firstly, great time overall, without a doubt one of the best times of the year...on par with the cruise with the Yerra's in 06. I got in about 1/2 hour before my family landed at the airport and met Murali babaya there. We went to his house for about and hour and then took the 5 hour drive to the boonies, Roanoke Rapids. When we got there we saw so many cousins and aunts and uncles. The mehendi night/lunch/dinner was amazing. I met a bunch of people from Long Island, they were kind of wierd but interesting none-the-less. That night we spent the night at the hotel, first time I've stayed at a hotel while in a city with family. I know it was necessary for accomadations, but it was definatly kind of wierd at first. Either way, on saturday morning we had the renewal of the vows, a mini-wedding, and a lot of spicy indian food for breakfast. From there we fit 6 people in a carolla to get to chick-fila and wal-mart. Somehow that was the first time Poonam akka, somewhere in her early 30's, went into a wal-mart. That night we had the reception which was a lot of fun (where the picture is from. Included are 12 of 13 cousins on the Atyam side). In usual Atyam fashion we danced until the hall closed, only 1 am this time but I think it was impressive enough for not being a real wedding. The set-up was beautiful topped off with an ice sculpture and a tree of strawberries. Me and Deepak had a little speech/slide show for my parents to celebrate their anniversary which was this February.
The next week was just kind of a jumble of things we did, I don't rmr when we did what. We played Bocchie ball for the first time, which was surprisingly fun. We watched Harry Potter at the midnight show, which was horrible because apparently people from small cities have no sense of common curtesy and won't shut up and because the air conditioner was broken and constantly clanging and making noise. One of the really really good days was Thursday when about 13 family members went to the National White water Training Center. We went white water rafting (class 3/4), zip lining (1/4 mile long), rock climbing, some went kayaking, and we all hung out in the sun. I was very surprised to see all the parents go zip lining, especially my parents and the adults from India. I'm really proud of them for being able to overcome their fears and go have fun like that. Our white water raft was awesome too, the guide was great, but I almost fell out twice, both times trying to make sure Navya didn't fall out. Also, the boys played soccer for a few hours outside (the girls remember this well because we chased them down and gave them all hugs).
Wednesday night we traveled to Charleotte but on the way we stopped at NC State to check out the campus, which Donovan was gracious enough to show us around. I'm pretty sure Deepak wants to go there now because their aerospace program is really strong, but the campus uses waaay too many bricks. Look it up, you'll see. Then we went to UNC- Chapel Hill. Yes, the disgusting rival of UCLA basketball. Don't worry true Bruins, there is nothing to fear. the campus reminds me a lot more of UCLA, but it is smaller and more compact. But their student center is pretty sweet, that is the only pro I could see over UCLA. Still, I would rather be a Bruin Basketball fanatic any day over any other school. Then we finally got to Neeli's house. I already explained thursday (white water rafting) and on friday we went to the mall for a few reasons...I think. Anyways, that night we stayed and Sreya and Ro's house (my mom's best friend from college who she's kept in contact with). They have a siiiick house. They lived in Tokyo for some time and have all these cool old artifacts, in addition to a pool table, media room, sweet kitchen, they just need thicker walls. But we got all the 6 of us cousins there and played apples to apples and hung out. Saturday's preformance by Anusha was amazing. 1 1/2 hours of pure dancing and I didn't even nod off. Truely an accomplishement if you know me at all. The dinner after was also awesome, except that we were told to help serve as we expected to. But when we got there all the adults thought we were useless and relegated us to useless tasks. These adults didn't understand how much experiance we had in the field and that we did not feel right at all to eat before serving everyone else. So we fought our way into releiving some from their duties. then we ate and then took some hundred picutures right outside with any combination of cousin/new friends we could make.
That night stayed up late, real late, slept for 45 minutes then Neeli and Sneha woke up to give me a ride to the airport. too bad when I got into the terminal I realized I didn't have my cell phone (in the car), my charger (finally ended up in deepak's bag), or my toilletries (at Sreya's house). I got home safe, took 2 hours to get to my house by bus in Seattle, but it was fine. The ensuing week without a cell phone was actually quite releiveing. It felt really good not to be tied down and obligated to respond immediately to phone calls and communication. The only downside was trying to make plans of facebook.
...And I'm done for the night. after a 58 hour work week I'm going to sleep in tonight. I'll catch up more later. gnight
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