A lovely evening at the theatre

This week has been an eventful and unpleasant one and I am happy that it is over.

In order to celebrate the end of the week, I joined some of my fellow classmates for dinner and then an excursion to the cultural center in Lucknow to see a play. Dinner was lovely and I had a salad made of iceberg lettuce and sun-dried tomatoes (beggars can't be choosers, salads are harder to come by than just about anything here and very expensive) and part of a cheese-less pizza. The pizza was good and I especially enjoyed the olives (yumm, olives). The cheese-less part was a hassle, of course, but worked out in the end. I can only imagine how strange the waiters and cooks must think I am ....

The play was extremely interesting. Its title was Mirza Bagh and it was directed by Sabina Mehta Jaitly, a director from Delhi. The actors were extremely skilled and a pleasure to watch. The play was in both Hindi and English. This means sometimes the actors would speak in English, sometimes in Hindi. This switching of languages reflects how many people communicate in their daily lives. It also does wonders for the amount of the play that I actually comprehend. I think that because my brain could take a break and listen to English intermittently, it tended to grasp more of the Hindi that was being spoken. The plot revolved around a fading nawabi (royalty associated with the Mohgals) family. The children of the family had gathered at the ancestral home because their father was dying. Mostly, the plot didn't go anywhere and the play mostly reflected on the frailty of being, the flawed-ness of individuals, nostalgia and the changing world. I found it meditative and insightful on multiple levels - but a large part of this is probably because I really like stories that spend a lot of time on reflection by characters.

Also, the weather seems to have changed and it is now cooler in the evenings. Last night, after my delicious dinner and exciting entertainment, I sat on the roof of my house, enjoyed being cold, and watched the clouds float through the sky.