Christmas Day cricket

I was at my teacher's house about 45 minutes early today, and planned to sit and read until it was time for my lesson. Three boys were out on the street playing cricket with a tennis ball and a wooden board for a wicket. I found a shady spot on the curb where I could sit, read, and watch their game. However, the next ball got hit right above my head. I jumped, but couldn't reach it-- it went over the fence into my teacher's courtyard.

The boys and I went to look for the ball, and one of them finally found it. "Are you going to come?" he asked. "Come play?" I was surprised, but secretly had been wanting to join in, even though they were about a dozen years younger than me. They put me at bat-- the first time I'd swung a cricket bat. I knew to hold it down by my feet, not up like a baseball bat. When the ball came, though, my baseball swing took over. I hit the first four balls solidly, bouncing a couple off a house on the other side of the road, and all of a sudden Arvin, one of the boys, was wondering why I didn't start an American cricket team. I gave him his answer, as the next ball bounced in front of me and spun off to the left. I swung and missed, Arvin pounced on the ball and threw it at the wicket, and I was out (bowled? I'm really fuzzy on the rules).

They tried making me bowl, too, but I wasn't too successful. I couldn't get the ball to bounce and still stay in the vicinity of the wicket. I think I also failed their quiz on Indian cricketers as well-- the kid threw me a bone at the end by asking if I knew Barack Obama.

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The rest of my day: 9:30 lecture on the history and evolution of the vina, $0.75 lunch, vocal improvisation lesson, Q&A session with Ranjani & Gayatri (part of an ongoing 'coffee with Carnatic celebrities' series), about half of a concert, a light dinner (fried banana & coconut chutney), then home.

What's going on

We're in the most hectic part of Chennai's music season. In the mornings, lectures from performers and musicologists (sometimes in English, sometimes in Tamil) start at 8:00 AM. If I make it to a lecture, I'll see a mid-morning concert or bike home for lunch. In the afternoon, I might have a lesson or take a nap. The big artists normally perform at 4:30 or 6:00, so I head out again for my main concert-going experience. These concerts last upwards of three hours. There seems to be a healthy sense of competition between the top-name artists. If one singer performs a piece that moves through a dizzying procession of 10+ ragas, others will feel compelled to introduce similar pieces.

My music lessons are more or less done, especially since my teachers and I are both busy with things we want to see. My Tamil lessons wrapped up yesterday. I can read slowly and say simple sentences, but am by no means conversational.

I have lots of half-completed blog entries and lists of things I want to write about, so I will try to catch up before I leave India. That's happening January 8th.