07/18

23:55 (writing this on 07/20)

Chill. After almost a whole week at the village, I spent the entire Saturday with the other interns and ICRISAT staff. We went to Ramoji City and the entire place was like an artificial Hollywood/Bollywood. They placed the Hollywood attractions in the very beginning to get people's attention. And, it worked!

Since we were hungry from the car ride, we quickly ate our lunch and watche a play. At first the Hollywood film confused me because it was a dancing lion filled with neon lights. But, then I realized that he was the host and the point of the show was to explore the different movie genres. Each genre highlighted a different movie like James Bond and Pirates and the Carribean. It was wonderful to see the mixture of cultures through the show. 

Our next stop was the Ramoji city tour. We practically saw all of India's architectures in 30 minutes. 

And, we visited the different gardens and I was mesmerized to see the beautiful sceneries! Hugo, the French intern, told me that people looked at nature for inspiration. And, I remembered looking at the birds and having the tendancy to stare at them and write a poem! I wanted to depict how they felt living in a cage, when they were meant to be fly freely. Then, I wanted to relate that to human lives. Nature is definitely an inspiration for my writing, and I feel at peace when I see animals and jaw-dropping nature views.

The best part about the entire garden area was the Bonsai garden. There were various Bonsai trees growing and they resembled different shapes that made them each unique. I am a fan of Bonsai Trees because of Muhammad Yunus's quote: "poor people are like Bonsai Trees", and Caela gave me one for my Birthday. 

Aside from the attractions in Ramoji, I particularly enjoyed hanging out with these folks. A chill day spent with chill people.