countdown (and not happy about it)

sigh.
i cant believe im leaving in two days. right now, its a quiet moment, only myself, piero and al are home since the others have gone to attend a wedding. it's been a fantastic day, im starting to pack, and getting extremely (as in, you have no idea, ridiculously so) reminiscent of my 10 weeks here.
work ended--3 hours of sleep last thursday night to finish my 27 page report of the survey. im proud of my work, and hopeful that i'll be able to use it in the future for something. it was a huge learning experience...i did not mention earlier that i was working with a very difficult woman who, in the end, actually fabricated 70 surveys. my boss doesn't seem to care all that much, and that was beyond frustrating.
it's ironic i suppose that the work experience has for sure confirmed for me my desire to work in this field of women's advocacy--but at the same time, it has shown me such a dark side of how NGOs can be, and i guess generally how low people are willing to stoop to avoid doing work.
tomorrow ill go to ramdarbar one last time to say goodbye to sonia and the other women who have been so good to me.
the past few days have been jam-packed and so much fun and full of seeing people and goodbyes--its nearing the end of the summer and most of us are heading home in time to start classes. we had a dinner the other night with over 20 of us interns, i love this one photo of all of us squished together, so many countries represented! a lot of eating out, goodbye parties, sharing desserts and coffee, photos, plans for future trips to visit each other...
yesterday al and i had a great touristy day in chandigarh. im so glad i decided to stay here for the weekend instead of traveling, it gives me the chance to do all my favorite things and the ones i didnt get to yet. we started the day by going to the chandigarh art museum and gallery.
al was a saint--seriously, i should've warned him about me and art galleries and how much time i take...its funny, piero said that it wasnt that good, just a lot of "old stuff"--but i loved, loved it. great contemporary art, and embroidery, religious art (my favorite!) and bronze hindu sculptures, and traditional indian miniature paintings that i could stare at for hours.
i regret that i didnt buy more art when i was here...then again, i think i always feel like i could've bought more of art, such an investment.
we walked through the zakir rose garden, the largest in asia, but most of the roses aren't in bloom. we appreciated our vanilla and mango popsicles more than the roses. we hit up some shopping, then al went home and i met piero and ganda to watch "Jaane Tu," one of the most recent Bollywood hits. i wanted to see it because there's one song in it that i heard in my friend suhil's car--and it gets stuck in my head at least 10x per day...and i love it.
its awesome watching a movie for three hours in a language you dont understand...im serious! it was very relaxing, i definitely enjoyed the music and admired the gorgeous indian actors and actresses and their abilities to act, sing, and dance.
very typical chic flick (tash, mc, sar...if only you were around), but with a few random bits, like the talking painting and the random desert scenes and cowboys, that made it so unique. what cracked me up even more was how many groups of boys in their late teens and 20's were also there...something that would never fly back home.
ok, if you really want to hear the song i was talking about :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvW4HOKcnPs
the boys humored me and allowed us to go to sagar ratna's for dosas...yum. we came back and didnt do too much, we wanted to find a club but everything was too pricey for us...i journaled, and read, and went to bed.
i was up this morning by 7 am and got ready, made pancakes (heh, with nutella and bananas...) for natasa, ganda, and myself before we headed off to "empower," a youth leadership workshop AIESEC put on for over (!) 400 college students. it was a blast, i always love being a facilitator, and we met loads of awesome, enthused people. my friend piyush spoke about his internship last year in NYC, and another session was put on by a guy from google (honestly, piyush's was much better--he just didn't have freebies). after that, all the @ers and some interns came back to the house and partied and celebrated their success.
i am going to miss these people so much--ive loved living in this house, just upstairs from the office, where i get to see them come in and out all the time. its really like having one gigantic family...today suhil and i had another fantastic conversation (as always) just on the drive home and it makes me feel desperate that i need more time to be here...
i took a nap, not even realizing i needed one, and al and i went to the market right after i woke up. there's a 7-11 type place here called spencer's--we interns frequent it a lot because they have all our essentials. it's small, and all the employees know us by name and country, and are insanely helpful and friendly. i took extra time during this visit to chat with some and they said they hoped i would come back and visit again.
i suppose thats the first of my goodbyes (though i have said goodbye to others, like nith who left a couple days ago, along with kristina), and it was so sad, and we're talking about the guys who sell me shampoo and granola...
al and i made our way to the first restaurant i went to in india, yummy yummy, for mango juice and paneer dosas (again, yum), bought cucumbers and mangoes, and came home and made kheer, rice pudding. we sat under the stars on our terrace and talked, and then al helped me pack, before we dug into our kheer topped with vanilla ice cream and the sweetest, most fragrant mangoes (you sense the pattern here?).
ive had a few tough moments in the past week, there was one afternoon where i was an absolute mess, emotional and illogical and tired. frustrated with work, how much is left to do, how much will be left undone, how much will never get done now that im leaving...i miss home, boulder and cornell, but i dont want to leave india. i dont feel ready whatsoever to leave, im dreading it. matan has gone into training for the next 10 weeks, and it feels like neither of us has gotten time at all to slow down and collect ourselves, separately and together, before jumping into the next stage that awaits. ill arrive in nyc at 6 am on wed, meet beau and annamarie for breakfast, then hop a bus to cornell, start RA training the next morning...
again...WHERE DID TIME GO?
oh, man...i am going to be such a wreck during goodbyes.
ganda is leaving tomorrow morning to spend 2 weeks back in indonesia, so in a matter of hours the series of seriously hard goodbyes begin...
p.s. just from using piero's laptop, ive learned some completely random portugese. im using ola's right now, and all the polish is trickier...think anyone could learn a language this way?