You Know You're in India When...

You wake up and the power is off (and not even at one of the regular outage times)
You have additional mosquito bites
Outside there is an amazing mixture of smells (curries, animals, fruit and other things that need not be mentioned)
You open a canister of rice and find all kinds of little bugs moving around inside
The guy who has your clothes for ironing runs up to you as you are in an auto rickshaw and motions somethings and mentions one word that you understand - tomorrow
There is a constant layer of dust on everything

So I'm sure, most people encounter one or two of these things, but for all to take place within a short span of time only means one thing...you aren't living in the US or any other developed country. :)

Apparently the transformer in our neighborhood is out. For the second time in less than 10 days (the other time I was still in Delhi, but they say it was decent weather and not so bad - currently it's 107 and supposed to reach 118). I have an inverter which so far, after over 10 hours is still holding up - can it go for another 5 -6, doubtful, but I'm hopeful. I have one fan going and all the lights off, sunset is at 7:10, so I may be enjoying a little candlelight by then.

I waited until 11 am to call and make sure that I wasn't the only one without power. Why is it reassuring to hear others are too? I guess that's because it's not longer "my" problem and someone else is going to be working on it. I'd already decided that since it was going to be hot, I'd start cooking my main meal early. I'd found a yummy Hawaiian Chicken to make - which really sounded like it would be more of a Sweet and Sour recipe. Yum. It was cooking when the kids came over...all running in with their noses sniffing, asking what smells so good. Yeah, it really did smell that good. Once it finished Lily was going to help me make "Perfect Rice" - which is actually the name of it in the cookbook. Only problem was, when I opened my rice canister there were all kinds of little bugs in it. I had read that if this happens, put them in the freezer and it'll kills the bugs and their eggs. I'm sure that requires a freezer that's actually freezing your food and not just maintaining it (my ice is melting). I finally decided to drowned any that had survived the not so freezing freezer. I'd made enough of this chicken to share with my landlord's son who is home alone as the rest of the family is all out of town and really needed rice to go with it. I think I got most of them, and the nice thing about "Perfect Rice" is you brown some onions and add it to them...this will cover any remaining bugs (from here on out considered as extra protein). No wonder I was in the hospital - just kidding, consuming random cooked bugs won't do that - it's the raw ones that do it.