Fleeting Moments, Images, and Little Things I Will Miss about India

I'm compiling a list before I depart...

The walk from Rastrapati Bhavan to India Gate

Power outages

Women riding sidesaddle on motorbikes

Entire families squeezed onto one motorbike (current record: 5)

Getting to class and finding it's cancelled, and you're the only one who didn't know

CHAI

Looking across the metro bench under the For Ladies Only sign and seeing a whole row of Indian men sitting down instead

Random encounters with Hijra (eunnuchs and transsexuals, the "third gender")

Long lines of schoolgirls on field trips emphatically waving and shouting "Hello Miss!"

Hot Butter Laccha Paratha

Rickshaw drivers

Rickshaw drivers' strikes

Strikes in general that pop up for no reason but are always incredibly inconvenient

Pan splatter on the pavement

Indian porn titles ("Adult Frantic Sexual Intercourse")

Surprising people talking about me in Hindi that I understand Hindi

Cursing said people in Hindi

Living in a country that has festivals six months out of the year

Hopping on a train at the last minute and seeing somewhere amazing

Feeling part of a group, sharing this crazy experience

Broken shoes

Conveniently located cobblers who sit on the side of the road waiting to fix your broken shoes

Steamed veggie momos

Pausing lecture for a chai break

Bucket showers

Playing with the stray dogs on my street, especially my little Blondie, even though they gave me fleas once and I get funny looks from Indians for doing it (some even try to "save me" from the dogs and chase them off)

Sarees

LIMCA. Charley will sympathize with me on this one It's a lemon-lime soda, like Sprite only a billion times better

Wednesday nights at Urban Pind, and their free mojitos

Children playing with dangerous fireworks in our park

The 5R shared auto ride that's supposed to take five minutes but doubles in time because the driver usually has to stop to replace a wheel or fix the brakes

Vegetable sellers, broom sellers, balloon sellers, all of them calling their wares from the street 

Cows. Everywhere.

Cow shit. Everywhere.

Only half-caring that your unplucked, unshaved areas make you look like some Cousin It-Grizzly Man hybrid

Maggi Masala Instant Noodles

The personal trainer at my gym (which is really just a stuffy 10' by 12' room with death trap machines in it) who threatens us with a long wooden rod and shouts commands in a drill sergeant voice

Shopping shopping shopping

Eating eating eating

Sweet lemons and sour oranges

India's crazy sense of time (yesterday and tomorrow are the same word in Hindi, same as the day before yesterday and the day after tomorrow)

Feeling part of a group, sharing this crazy experience

Finding writing inspiration everyday

Smiles from strangers (because one smile makes up for a hundred hostile glares)

Living in a foreign nation alone and not losing my mind (completely that is)

Learning I can be independent 

Surviving

Waking up and knowing that a whole different world is just a few steps outside my door...

And of course, being surprised by the fact that the things I'm going to miss the most are sometimes the ones that make my life so difficult now.