Elaine's last day in India

Hey all,

This Tuesday was the the last day Elaine had in India. Since I had been gone for a 4 day weekend I worked for a few hours in the morning, then Elaine, Tracy, and I all tromped down to commercial street with two objectives: Get Elaine a nose piercing (!!!) and get Elaine a sari. We succeeded in both fronts. The really nice jewelry store where we initially wasn't available for appointments, but after wandering about for a bit (and me buying myself a small emerald earring that looks pretty cool ^_^) we found a street full of jewelers, one of whom pierced Elaine's nose. It was a rather *brutal* process to watch, and I'm glad Elaine couldn't see it or she probably would have freaked out (they had to push some widening stuff through the hole after it was made by the gun) and *both* of us were lightheaded afterwards. She and Tracy also bought several really cool nose piercings.

After the piercing we went shopping for sarees at the Mysore silk emporium, and Elaine and Tracy both found some *beautiful* sarees. Definitely check out the pictures (from this whole day) here. Tracy headed back to the office to get some work done while Elaine and I had her last meal here at The Paradise Club on MG road (Palak Paneer ^_^), then met up with Nels and went to the same shop that I had gone to previously with Dad. I'm getting the guy there a *ton* of business, and he gave me some really large (like 30%) discounts without me even asking ^_^.

We all went back to my apartment at this point, finished packing up and everything, then Elaine and I watched "Muriels Wedding" and finished just before the cab came to take us to the airport. It was a zoo at the airport, but I have learned to deal with lines in India (shove your way in wherever you can, keep doing that, and feel no guilt) and we got through the line pretty quickly. I went around to the visitors area, and saw her off nicely. I was *really* sad to see her go, but her visit has been a lot of fun ^_^.

I took a prepaid rickshaw back to the apartment, and then stayed up till 3AM doing random futzing on the computer and finally went to sleep.

Thats all for now. I'm getting closer to actually being caught up on this blog!

Cheers,
Jason