i'm gonna be strong, i'm gonna be fine, don't worry about this heart of mine

I have Ace of Base's 'Don't Turn Around' stuck in my head. How sad is that? The only way to exorcise it, of course, is to listen to it on constant repeat until I go to bed; by the time I wake up tomorrow morning, I will be ready to go back to my usual options of techno or Counting Crows.

Ace of Base inevitably reminds me of Ukraine, as does Billy Joel and the Beatles--the only tapes I listened to in Ukraine were Billy Joel tapes and the Beatles' Greatest Hits tapes, and I believe Darryl Hall and John Oates, and so whenever we heard Ace of Base blasting in the market, it was always enjoyable. Luckily for us, it was blasting all the time, which no doubt had just as much of an ill effect on my adolescent development as the rampant radioactive contamination.

Dinner tonight was good, but also sad. It was good in the sense that Ranjit made his version of Thai food, which is most certainly not pad thai or tasty yellow curry from Krung Siam in Palo Alto (and did you know that it's really Kiung Siam or something? their sign is impossible to read). Nonetheless, Ranjit's curries and noodle dishes are always good, and he topped it off with a delicious custard. However, it was sad because we all started reminiscing about the foods that we miss, such as hamburgers, or sushi, or (and I admit that I was the only person who missed this) bologna sandwiches on white bread with Miracle Whip. I've probably had a peanut butter sandwich for lunch on seven of the last ten working days; there's a cafeteria, but the food is all a) spicy, b) greasy, and c) gross. I like some spicy foods, but I can't eat it with every single meal; I like a lot of greasy foods, but only if the grease is the result of frying or the result of too much cheese on a pizza, not if it is just pools of grease forming in an already-unappealing curry sauce; and c) I have eaten a lot of gross stuff in my life, but I try to limit my gross experiences to two meals per week. Some days I eat the food just because I can't stand the thought of peanut butter again, or because the guys who work in the cafeteria look crestfallen when I head for the peanut butter rather than the real food...but most of the time I can't bring myself to do it. So, on days when I have time, I have a bowl of cornflakes for breakfast and a peanut butter sandwich for lunch, followed by a large dinner; but some days (like today) I have to skip either breakfast or lunch because I have meetings. Sad, eh?

Nothing else is happening here; Tuesdays are pretty dead in the expat community in general and in my life in particular. I had a call tonight from 9:30 to 10:30, so I couldn't go out, and I also couldn't go to bed at nine like I wanted to. Tomorrow, however, I'm going to Meena Bazaar on a perilous errand to get my lehnga stitched in time for the wedding I'm attending next week; whether I will return with my temper and sanity intact is anyone's guess, since I'm currently railing against my complete lack of independence and so feel a little snappish towards service people of all kinds. The people at Meena Bazaar are nice, however, and they usually serve you Thums Up in a small plastic cup while you're waiting, so I can't be too annoyed.

I've been here almost five weeks! That's amazing to me--and it feels like my normal home self has finally crawled into some sullen dormancy so that I won't be dwelling on what I'm missing back home. That's good--now the part of me that misses Iowa, and which I beat into submission several years ago, will have something to keep it company while I blithely go about my business. I really can't believe that I'm in India--it's so alien from my experience in the States that it seems like the States can't really exist. I know objectively that it's 11am on Tuesday in California, that people are probably now at work after their enjoyable three-day weekend, and that many of my friends are preparing for finals and/or graduation. And yet, it is impossible that any of that is happening; how can there be a place where there are traffic lights, and steak, and ketchup that isn't rotting in the bottle, and all of the friends and family whom I have left behind? No, it's easier to believe that these things have ceased to exist, and that they will be reanimated just as I left them when I return.

That's incredibly self-centered of me, isn't it? I think it's a defense mechanism; for instance, my mind can't accept that the lipgloss that I wear to work probably cost more than most of the people walking constantly in the street make in a whole week. So, it's easier to accept, highlight, and cherish the surreal than it is to get down to the business of actually thinking about where I am and what everything means.

Okay, enough of this--I sometimes write just because I like the way the words sound, and I don't really think that any of you are paused until I get back, or that I can't comprehend my surroundings. However, I do feel guilty about the sheer amount of stuff I have, and the fact that I accumulate more every day. I don't know whether to hope that that guilt will pass with time or not; if it passes, I would be more comfortable, but then again it would imply that my heart has become completely hardened to my surroudings. I can't act upon anything I think about right now anyway, so I think it's time for bed!