Power Cuts

8/9/10 5pm

This morning I gave a presentation to a group of English teachers from KV schools around Delhi. I'll be giving a similar talk on Wednesday to a group of teachers at my own school, so it was nice to only have to prepare one presentation. It feels like forever since I was at my host school (it was actually last Thursday) and let me tell you, I am extremely excited to get back there tomorrow… especially since our last day is Thursday!

The one thing I forgot regarding this presentation was that in India, the power goes out fairly regularly for minutes or hours at a time. This is all well and good until you are in the middle of a PowerPoint presentation and both the power and the backup generators stop working… which is what happened to me today! But really, it's not like things were ruined by any stretch. I was able to finish saying what I needed to say (forgot a few minor points, but oh well) and from the feedback I received from the teachers to whom I was presenting, it was a success.

But oh, the heat.

We don't have this kind of heat and humidity in the States, and while I have made major strides in putting up with it, I still don't feel adjusted to it completely. This is the kind of weather that makes it hard to climb a flight of stairs without getting winded, where your clothes stick to you, where drops of sweat roll down your back, where you sweat in places you don't normally sweat like your knees and the tops of your feet. And today it was bad, worse than usual, to the point where during my (hopefully last) souvenir and gift buying excursion I actually felt my heart pounding because my blood pressure had risen. So I gave up officially on trying to find something for Jason's dad (that man is impossible to buy for unless you are in Cabela's) and headed back to the air conditioned comforts of my hotel room. And consider myself lucky because a lot of people in this city don't have nice places to go, let alone air-conditioned ones.

I'm pretty tired from the heat plus the three late nights in a row I've had, so I am going to take this opportunity to enjoy some room service for dinner and get to bed early. Not a whole lot going on tomorrow, but on Wednesday the end-of-India whirlwind begins with some birthday celebrations and other festivities. At some point I need to figure out what size bag I need to buy to lug all the stuff I've bought home- this was part of my plan, and I really should have taken care of this sooner- now I'm stressing about it because I procrastinated!

I am also taking some time tonight for making a list of foods I want Jason to have on hand when I get home. There are things I miss, such as our homemade burritos, blueberries, raw vegetables, salad, American Diet Coke (it IS different here), the tomato pie from the bakery across the street, and grapefruit juice. I know he really misses me and can't wait for me to get home so I need to have *something* to occupy his time. After all, it's been a whole month that we've been gone!