Diwali in Delhi, part 2

A continuation of the last post:

Continuing on with the weks theme, day 4 was excellence. Mehendi for me and Kalki, puja at the office, decorating the house, shopping in sarojini, and a 3 hour puja in the evening, followed by a garden party and fireworks outside the city!

We once again went to bed at a ridiculous hour, but sleeping in is a most satisfying time waster.
When we got up, Kalkidan and I went downstairs to get our mehendi done after a gorgeous breakfast of I'm-not-even-sure-but-it-was-good.

Find the "E"

See it yet?

While my mehendi was drying, we drove up to Mr Agarwal's office in the industrial area of Delhi for a brief puja

By the time we got back the rest of the household had awakened, and it was time to decorate! 

Aaaannnd blogger is telling me I have maxed out my 1GB of alloted photo space on this blog.

Damn.... any advice, fellow bloggers?

If you have me on facebook, you can see the photos there.

Anyway, after we finished decorating, we went out to the cheap shopper's dream come true: Sarojini! Even if you have to sift through loads and loads of junk, when you do find something worthwhile, it more than makes up for it. I aquired a purse, a scarf, and a sweater (as well as more presents!) for less than 5$. Definitely a place to remember if you're ever in Delhi!

After making our purchases at Sarojini we returned home to prepare for another evening of parties. We got all gussied up in our new salwar suits, made each other up and went fown toparticipate in the puja.

Tanuvee's father, taking after his father, is very fond of elaborate pujas on the third night of Diwali. This one was over 3 hours long, and included 5 pandits (Hindu priests) and 51 diyas! We bathed and fed the gods Lakshmi and Lord Ram, from toe to head. The girls left a bit early (our legs were going numb) and we proceeded to have a dance party in the living room. Awesome!!!

Following the puja, we had the post-worship meal, and headed out to the garden party/firework lighting. I was introduced to red and green sparklers, waterfall firecrackers, and spinning tops that shoot sparks everywhere. Damn I wish I could upload pictures!

We then proceeded to devour some really good pizza and cake, and tried our hand once again at cards. I lost magnificently but not so much that I went into debt to the "Bank" of chips. :P

We got home relatively early (only 2:30 am), and I skyped a couple of folks back home (gotta take advantage of the good internet!) Sleep came fast upon us.

The next day, we had to get up SUPER EARLY: 9:30 am!

We got to Indira Gandhi airport and proceeded to take the quickest flight ever to Dehra dun. It was actually really weird only flying for 40 minutes... I was expecting the next time I flew to be more like 27 hours... LOL that's in 2 weeks!!!!

So that concludes my Diwali vacation. I hope you enjoyed and that you'll all like your Christmas presents!

Emily