Nandan’s mother quizzed me the other night by writing some sentences in English and then asking me to write them in Hindi. I did well, and I was lucky that three of the words she chose I had just learned that day.
My routine has been the same for a while. I study old flashcards everyday for about an hour. I write about thirty new flashcards every other day. I do the writing exercises in my grammar book for about ninety minutes daily. I read outloud for about forty minutes daily. I do rote memorization by writing vocabulary or phrases for about forty minutes daily. At some point during the day Nandan or Rajan look over my writing and correct it. I still have no teacher but at this point I do not feel that I need a formal one. Still I do not talk much.
Holi is on March 4. This is a holiday involving the throwing of “colors,” which are unnaturally bright powders which I have not been able to identify. Nandan tells me that these are dangerous chemicals but people throw them anyway. No one seems to know what the powders are, but in American chemistry labs and with my experience at home using Procion MX dyestuffs I have never elsewhere seen such optically attractive coloring agents. I am not sure to what extent I would like to participate. It sounds like a horrible mess and I am concerned that as a foreigner I would be targeted beyond my comfort level, but I still want to see what it is all about.