Sometimes I forget how much my relatives in India love and miss me. I don’t get to see them that often. I’ve only been to India four times and three of those times were recent (since my Dad passed away in July 2008) when my sister and I started trying to go every year to see our grandma. The trip (it is almost 24 hours!) is too hard for her to make so we decided to go there.
We’ll be going to India in the fall for one of my cousin’s weddings. It’ll be nice to have celebration to go to—Indian weddings are the best. They last for days. So much food, dancing and preying. Plus, they are huge. My cousin’s fiancé invited 4,000 plus people to their wedding a couple years ago—basically her entire village. And the bride’s dad took out a crazy number of mortgages on their family home to finance the wedding (the rumor was 11 mortgages, which I wouldn’t doubt; the white horse or elephant the groom rode in on must have cost a fortune in and of itself).
Anyway, I talked to one of my cousins the other night (well it was night for me and breakfast time for him) and he was telling me how my family is always talking about my sister and me and telling stories about us and wishing we didn’t live so far away. It was so nice to hear. I’ve only met some of those relatives once and you’d never know it. They probably hear about us from my grandma, we call her Mama. That woman is the busiest 84 year-old I know. She’s on her cell phone (the screen of her cell phone is a picture of the God Krishna; actually its baby Krishna and I find it so sweet and kind of funny) half of the day talking to her siblings and sister-in-laws laughing and telling stories. I talk to Mama on the phone once a month or so. I used to mail her cards and letters but lately Mama hasn’t been receiving them. Mama sends me emails via my young cousin; Mama writes a note in Hindi and gives it to my cousin who then translates it into English for the email. It’s a collaborative process and they have it down to a science. My Indian family is full of amazing, caring and loving people and I’m so lucky to be related to them.
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