Happy Diwali!
Yesterday was Indian New Years. Practically everyone celebrates (except Muslims and Christians) and it is called the Festival of Lights. In front of every house their are beautiful paper lanterns and lots and lots of lights strung everywhere. Fireworks go off every few seconds and the sky is illuminated with sparkles. It's really fun and exciting, but at the same time scary to walk around because I feel like I'm going to be blown up by the large popping fireworks that the kids love to set off everywhere just to shock everyone.
Last night we Chaitra and Ashish bought tons of fireworks and we went to an empty field nearby to set them off for over an hour. It was really fun, but scary because Indian fireworks seem to have a much shorter fuse and go off after only one second of being lit. Ashish and Sean almost killed themselves more than once, while I on the other hand stood a healthy distance away from the launch zone. In the end Sean successfully completely blew up his Nalgene (the almost indestructable water bottle--for those of you who don't know) by lighting off lots of fireworks inside it. Oh what fun. ;o)