who, us, social?

The past week witnessed us going out of our house with NON-FAMILY MEMBERS on not just one but two occasions!*

Last week Uncle "I'm A Peace Loving Man" Sunil was in town from Bangalore, trucking through on his way from Beijing and going to Moldova. Yeah...uh, I'm not sure how Delhi becomes the main point between those two places, but whatever. Lucky for us cause we got to see him! Sunil once again tried to deny our oft-offered (and reknown) Sayo Niedzwiecki hospitality suite because he was arriving in the wee hours of the morning. He stayed at a hotel that first night and then came over the next day, only to be greeted by a rant from me about how he's an idiot for not just coming in the middle of the night. Poor guy. "Come, stay with us. Or else!"

Ji Hong hung out with Sunil but was not impressed with his unwillingness to be dragged into a wrestling match. He also made sure that we all knew that Sunil knew nothing about superheroes, and that on the one-hour taxi ride to the Holi party he and Kiran told Ji only about "god stories". These, apparently, are a yawn. We tried to get Ji excited about the fact that Sunil had a personal chat with George Soros for an hour recently. No spark.

Phet and I, on the other hand, were very pleased to have Sunil around and enjoyed his company very much. On his first day in town we dragged him out to eat kathi kebabs. Ooooh, these are totally killer treats. Basically, they are the equivalent of a giant fried breakfast (so long as you had fried bread). You take a big, circular roti and fry it up crisply in a heap of oil, then you fill it up with fried eggs, onions, and pieces of grilled chicken kebabs. You roll that up like a souvlaki on a pita and then lace it with mint sauce and ketchup. Oh man, are they ever good!

Here's Nizam's, at Connaught Place, where we went for the kebabs. Or kababs. Or kebobs. Just as a side note, it was very hot when we went out to eat the kebabs. Very hot indeed. It has been very hot all the time lately. Like yesterday? It was 42.4' celsius. That's HOT. We went out to see a movie and since it was Sunday and John wasn't working we took a cab. There wasn't any air con. Hot. Yes. But a very interesting hot. Not at all a Bangkok / KL / Vientiane / Hanoi hot, where you are all sweaty and oogy. A dry hot. Sitting in the car sort of felt like sitting inside a clothes drier with a hair drier blowing on us. I think we lost about 5 kilos of water through our pores just on that one ride. But I didn't feel the sweat at all because it evaporated so incredibly quickly. We knew we'd really been through something, though, cause when we got home we ALL lay down for an hour and a half and all we'd done was sit in a car, sit in a theatre, and sit in a restaurant. To sum up: it's HOT.

While Sunil was in Delhi we also arranged to meet up with The Famous Lawrence Liang. Phet has been telling me about Lawrence for ages now, but this was my first chance to meet him. Lawrence, like Sunil, is involved in open activities; basically they're in the pro-intellectual freedoms, boo-copyrights, yuck-unfairness, down with monopolies, remember the little guys, and hoo-rah pirates gang. Lawrence is also a lawyer and works with groups trying to provide legal assistance to people who wouldn't have access to a lawyer. He's also from a Chinese background, but his family has lived in India for several generations. So, sounds like a fairly interesting dude, right? Well, turns out he is an absolute hoot. He engaged with Seung Yi and Ji on the level I have come to expect only from Sayo / Niedzwiecki family members, and challenged Ji to defend his superheroic beliefs on every level. He's also a real wit. His disses of Sunil had us all killing ourselves laughing, and Sunil later told us that his very first girlfriend developed a huge crush on Lawrence after following his public debating performances. Lawrence also reminded me alot of Dad, and Phet concurred; he has glasses like Dad's high school ones, demonstrated a sincere appreciation for good food and an ability to enthusiastically order a feast for the whole table, and seems (like Dad) to be one of those people who is both really smart and also really funny. Conclusion? I hope Lawrence will avail himself to the guest suite!

When we went out to dinner with Lawrence and Sunil (all of us squished in the car with the kids, and John driving) I had my first experience of Old Delhi. We'd been planning to eat at a place called Kareem's in Nizamuddin, but it was closed on Mondays, so we went to their old town location. Driving in Nizamuddin was nuts: we got there just as everyone was leaving the mosque, and the streets were just barely wide enough for our car. All the shops were about a metre wide, and the area was packed with butchers and bakers and candlestick makers and potato friers and trinket sellers. Old Delhi seemed spacious in comparison! The restaurant was just across from the Jama Masjid, the biggest and most important mosque in India, and was sandwiched among many other places selling aromatic grilled meats of all varieties. At Kareem's we had an insane amount of food. We started out with minced lamb kebabs and grilled lamb chops. Then we had honey-dipped thick flat breads, naan, chicken curry, brain curry (bleh), and a spicy saucy meat dish. We ate ourselves silly and laughed at Lawrence carrying on with Ji. It was a meal I wish y'all could've shared with us.

This weekend we also went out again. I know, incredible, but we did. On Saturday Ji and I went to the American School's annual flea market and then watched the middle school boys' basketball team play a game. In the afternoon we went to see Revenge of the Space Pandas, a David Mamet play put on by the middle school drama department and starring several of my students, and then we went over for a swim date and dinner at my colleagues' house. We had such a great time. These friends live at the school and have two boys (KG and grade two) and are very kind and friendly. Ji had a great time at the pool and then with the boys and their toys and their videos. We enjoyed having the opportunity to talk to adults other than just ourselves and stuffed ourselves with home-cooked grilled chicken and salad. A fine time was had by all.

Maybe there's hope that we won't live in quite the hermitly way we did in Bangkok!

*These people were also NOT our employees.

[Delhi-30-April-2007]