Ho ho ho...

Merry Christmas! Or, as everyone here says, happy Christmas. It has been an interesting christmas eve and day so far. The highlights are as follows.

In the morning, we went to church and got just about the same christmas service that happens at home. There was a large production done by the kids of the church in which the director of the music was really bad at keeping time, which was pretty amusing. Later in the day, we went and bought little cakes for our second gifts to our secret santees. Everyone here buys cakes for Christmas for their families. Also, a lady that we bought a blanket for a couple of days ago came and gave me a necklace. I'm not sure how she got it, but I think someone was handing them out or something. Regardless, it was cool to get a gift from someone with so little of her own.

Later, I received my second secret santa gift, which was a rubik's cube underneath the tiniest christmas tree ever (Yes James, smaller than the one you gave us). It turns out that it's great for when you're bored with nothing to do in the hotel after a certain person falls asleep at 7:30. Kristen's present didn't come. We're not sure if the person just forgot, or if she'll get two tonight.

At night, we were talking with the family whose father has been sick. They are all from a village and come into the city to try and make money selling chai. A couple of the older children stay in the village most of the time and go to school, I think. Anyway, since the husband wasn't working lately, they didn't have the money to go home and be with their children for Christmas and were pretty sad about it. The money was a pretty huge sum to them, but it only came to like $13, so we gave them the money. Now, they are going to get their children and when they come back they will bring them with them. They were very happy to get to do this and it was really fun to get to do something for them on Christmas eve.

After we were back in our hotel, we were sitting and reading when we heard what sounded like a band, only less organized. I thought that it sounded like it was in our building. So, we opened the door and there they were, coming up the stairs. Complete with trumpet, clarinet, drum, and metal shakers, they blared a slightly off-key jingle bells in our faces. So, being americans, we grabbed our camera and got a picture of me amongst the band members. I hope we can figure out a way to post the picture, because it's pretty funny. It made for a good Christmas memory if nothing else.

Today, we got up on Kristen and my first christmas morning together and went to work at Kaligaht for the morning shift. I had french toast for breakfast at our resturaunt, but I missed christmas morning bubble bread (if you don't know what that is, maybe my mom will make you some sometime). Some of the older women who are volunteering had brought a stereo to the home and played christmas music, so it made it feel more like christmas. They had christmas mass in the home right about time to leave, so we thought we'd check it out since it's not every day you have christmas mass in mother teresa's first home. Since we aren't catholic, we were kind of confused at times, but it was good nonetheless.

After work, we went to New Market and bought our big secret santa gifts. I got mine a scarf/shawl thing that kristen recommended and a santa hat. Kristen got hers a similar scarf.
We also bought 10 fruitcakes to give to the people we know on the street. Just before we came to check our email, we went and distributed them to the various people. It all went well and we didn't even get mobbed by other beggars. It has been a very different, but good Christmas. Now, we're getting ready to go to our volunteer's potluck dinner and gift exchange where we're supposed to bring a food from our country. Since the U.S. basically rips of other countries' foods, we're getting a bunch of french fries from the blue sky cafe and some "American" flavored lays chips. They really are american flavored, and apparently, americans are of the flavor "Style Cream and Onion" (No typo. Style.) But anyway, merry Christmas to all and to all a goodnight. Eat some pie for me. I'm missing it.