bargaining at bazaars

Last night, we visited pondy bazaar, a fairly popular shopping district which is about twenty or thirty minutes from home. It's basically just a street set up with booths of vendors selling clothing (kurtas, saris), jewelry, flowers, or just about anything else. You can bargain with the shop owners, so we devised an amazing plan to prevent me (the obviously non-native) from getting ripped off. I would go with either Hannah of Christina and look to see what we liked, and then I would leave the booth, laying all the items over the right side of the piles. Then Jesintha, the bargaining guru would come behind us, not acting like she knew us and drive a hard bargain :). It was very fun, and I got many clothes and gifts. Around eight, it started raining, or rather flooding, haha. It was raining so hard that the shops started closing and we had to stop in a local store to wait for it to lighten up. I was enjoying just being cool, but it was hilarious to see people walking around with plastic bags on their heads to try to keep from getting wet. Because the rain created such an uproar, it took forever to finally find an auto taxi to get home, and the traffic was absolutely ridiculous. It is hard to explain the driving here because it is so chaotic and so different from the lines and red lights of America. From what I've observed, most taxi and car drivers maintain the mentality that they will drive, and everyone else must move out of the way. The scooters and motorcycles then just go everywhere in between. It is quite a sight and an experience on the roads of India. 

Today, Hannah visited some of the colleges in the area that she may be attending to get a better idea of the different schools. Christina and I walked around town, visited a local book store, and got a free ride from a very kind auto driver. We got in, and some of the people said in Tamil that "she wants to sit in front so she can see the city" haha, so then kicked into tour guide mode and asked Christina where I was from and how I was liking India. It was great seeing such hospitality. The scooter has been broken the last two days, so we just walked, which was actually great. But now the scooter is fixed after being in repair, so I believe me and Hannah will be going for a ride before dinner. Hope everyone's summer is splendid, I hear it's pretty hot in Georgia too! :)

A typical street in Chennai