On our last day in India, we went to a bazaar (open-air market) in Rishikesh. The bazaar had several roads full of little shops to buy things like clothes and jewelry. I bought three small silver charms and two pairs of earrings. When buying things at the bazaar, we’re encouraged to bargain for lower prices. It was more difficult to bargain in India because we didn’t know the language.
I was more successful at getting discounts at the bazaars in Nepal since our teachers gave us language lessons on how to bargain in Nepali. Though the storekeepers still see us as tourists, they’re more likely to drop their prices because we tried to speak their language. This doesn’t work all the time, but it’s definitely fun to practice Nepali this way!
I didn’t read any books this week, but I did read academic papers about farming in Nepal. I’m planning to do my semester research project on farming in Nepal, so I did lots of research during my breaks in India. I also used those papers to help write an essay that was due on Wednesday. The paper was about how Nepali farmers are affected by natural disasters like floods and earthquakes.
I played a lot of hacky sack! My friend taught all of us how to play hacky sack, and she even sewed me a hacky sack for my birthday. It’s made out of an old tshirt and stuffed with uncooked rice and other things she found in her homestay mom’s kitchen cabinet. You need at least two people to play hacky sack. If there’s more, everyone stands in a circle.
