Christmas prep and Indus Day 2013

I mentioned in my last post how difficult it is to get in the holiday spirit here given the lack of commercialization, lack of cold weather, and lack of "Christmas in your face" nature of the holidays in the US.  I started seeing Facebook posts from friends in the US complaining about holiday decorations as far back as September.  But here, the minimal decorations just started appearing about a week ago.  and they seem so out of place in Bangalore where the temperature gets to a low of about 68 degrees in the evening.  I still sometimes feel like I am on a long, strange vacation that should end any day with our arrival back in snowy New England.  Then I realize that I am here for another 18 months and I need to figure out a way to find my Christmas spirit without the help of over-commercial displays or in your face advertising displays or snowy weather.  

We actually packed our fake Christmas tree with all of our belongings back in August.  I remember thinking that Kyle was crazy to pack our fake tree but now that I see how difficult it is to get a tree here I am very thankful to have it, even if it takes up our entire storage area the rest of the year.  Our elf also found us in India but he is much lazier here.  So far he has only moved once and I'm not sure he has any intention of moving again, but he is watching us in his typical creepy fashion.  So, we have our elf, our tree is decorated and there are a few poinsettia plants out front and that is Christmas in Bangalore!

Our Christmas tree.  

Mike and his friend, Sinjin, playing "football" after decorating the tree.  You can see why it is difficult to get into holiday spirit here with short-wearing weather!

But, what reminded me most of Christmas at home so far was the Indus Day extravaganza at the kids' school.  It had nothing to do with the holiday and was held outdoors on a Friday evening in December so I have no idea why it made me think of home, but it reminded me of the holiday concerts the younger kids put on every year at school.  The difference at Indus is that Indus Day is a HUGE production that the kids practice for months.  It is usually involves a leadership theme that the kids learn about all year long and each grade prepares a program that lasts for about 20 minutes to tell a story about that theme.  This year's theme was myths/stories and moral imagination.  There were workshops about moral imagination and what it means to each child.  My favorite part was the little girl interviewed about Beauty and the Beast and what the moral was to her.  Her answer, "If you are pretty you don't have to be nice."  My immediate thought was - so said the pretty girl :)  But I know what she meant - that you can't judge a book by its cover and that just because someone is pretty it doesn't mean they are nice.  Every child took part in a leadership seminar that talked about moral imagination and what can be learned from stories that have been passed down over the generations.  Then each grade level prepared their own interpretation of a story.  Grade 4 did an Indian story about Hunaman - each child had a part - either as a singer, dancer, story teller or actor.  Mike was one of the dancers for the Hunaman warrior dance and he was amazing (as were all of the kids!)  The kids were very serious about practicing and were so proud of their performances.

Mike at the start of the performance

I think what made me think of home was the pride in performing.  The holiday concerts at home are not nearly as elaborate or even fun (seriously, other than watching your own child, who likes a school concert?) but the kids are always so proud that they worked hard and did something well and their parents were there to see them.  

I have lots of opinions about education and school systems - both here and at home - and some of those opinions are fairly negative.  I think US schools are far too focused on tests and test scores and not nearly concerned enough about learning.  I was one of the best at getting good test scores when I was in school and I was very proud of those grades.  But it wasn't until I was 15 or 16 that I realized I was really good at taking tests and not really good at learning anything - there is a HUGE difference between the two.  Thankfully I had some great high school teachers and college professors that helped me learn how to learn and I think I am better at most things I do because of it.  I hate that schools are moving closer and closer to more test/score focused learning and that the process of learning is getting lost in the mix.  

One of my (many) concerns about Indus was its strong academic focus.  I liked that the kids would be pushed academically and Jameson in particular needs to be allowed advanced academics or he will be extremely bored in school.  But I was concerned with both the Indian reputation for rote-based learning expectations and Indus' focus on allowing the kids to do whatever they want (go to class, leave class, ignore classroom discussions) and just either pass or fail the test without any apparent concern for what was being learned in the process or accountability for what the teachers were doing to help the students learn.  I still have these concerns (especially at the 7th grade level), but this experience actually made me feel a little better.  The kids are taking part in discussions that they need to be comfortable having.  And, they are having those discussions with kids from different parts of the world, with different skin colors and different views on the world.  And, they are learning that making a presentation, whether that presentation be singing, dancing, acting or speaking, in front of other people is an important part of learning.  If you aren't comfortable speaking opinions and being open to different views you are not going to be a very happy person.  The unhappiest people I encounter are those that believe everyone else is stupid because they have different world views.  Hopefully my kids will be happy with themselves even if their views are different than others and they will learn acceptance and happiness in a world of increasingly rigid learning structures and increasingly exclusive belief systems.  In my opinion, that is what the Christmas holiday is about.

Thanksgiving in India

Thanksgiving is our first traditional American holiday here in India.  Since Thanksgiving isn't celebrated in India the kids still had to go to school and the spouses still had to go to work on Thursday and Friday.  On the up side, Friday morning was the first morning since we've been here that Kyle woke up to only a handful of emails and missed, overnight phone calls rather than the dozens he usually wakes up to.

We were able to celebrate two traditional Thanksgiving meals during the week.  On Thursday, after the kids and hubbies were all sent on their way, my friend, Sue Hess, spent the day slaving in her kitchen to provide a meal with all the American fixings.  She managed to make a turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes and wonderful pie!  I can only imagine the sight of Sue in her kitchen with her housekeeper, cook and driver all trying to help with the chopping, mixing and baking.  The household help here really does not like to let the "Madams" work at anything.  My driver won't let me carry a thing, even if I can probably carry more weight than he can.  If I move around the house attempting to do anything - put away clothes, make lunch - someone swoops in to do it for me.  I suppose it is all part of the Indian caste system where the Madams and Sirs are the ultimate bosses and should be treated like royalty.  Some people may think this is nice, I find it strange.  Given this mentality, the household help must have been beside themselves with the Madam doing any work at all.  But she did it and it was delicious!  A true American Thanksgiving even if it happened before most Americans even woke up and well before the kick off of even the earliest football game of the day.

Dinner included our family as well as the Hess family and one little Swedish girl who is friends with one of the Hess children.  At the bus stop the next morning I asked her if she liked Thanksgiving.  She said she did but didn't realize that it revolved around so much food, and only food!

On Saturday we were invited to participate in a much larger gathering with several ex-pat families in the community.  Kyle and I cooked two turkeys - one in the oven and one in the smoker.  As you can imagine from my lamenting here about the lack of reliable power, the power went out while Kyle was cooking the turkey.  He managed to move the turkey to the gas grill and finish cooking it outside.  The downside of outdoor cooking in India is that is attracts the many wild animals in the area.  In our case, cats.  And lots of them.  They found their way to the three doors to our house and sat outside crying and trying to sneak in.  It was heartbreaking and annoying all at the same time.

Kyle smoking the turkey

Around 3 in the afternoon we brought our turkeys and fixings to the party where we enjoyed the company of many people from all over the world.  There were at least 7 turkeys, 2 hams, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, yams, stuffing, cranberries, and many other side dishes.  There was also an overflowing assortment of wine and beer.  Of course, in true Palm Meadows style, no party would be complete without over the top party decorations.  And, in India, it is true that your drivers can arrange for just about anything.  So our Thanksgiving party decorations were live turkeys.  I've never seen a live turkey in India, a country where I've seen wild dogs, cows, goats, chickens, pigs and monkeys roaming the streets, but never a turkey.  Yet, we had two live turkeys at the party watching as we stuffed ourselves on their cooked counterparts.

All in all it was a great Thanksgiving.  Good food, good friends, 80 degrees and sunny!  I know, not New England weather, but I was thankful for sunshine and kids that could run around outside for hours rather than driving the adults crazy.  We even had a traditional Indian portion to our celebration when we ended the evening with fireworks.  Many of the concerned parents reminded us that fireworks are illegal in the US and maybe this wasn't the smartest idea to light fireworks on a small street with lots of tree cover (it wasn't smart), but I had to jump in with - It's legal in NH - still not smart, but legal! Just another NH night in India I guess.