My trip to India

We arrived here on Uttarayan which is a day of the kite festival. In short, people get on their roofs and fly colorful kites and try to cut each other’s kite. I went to the roof soon after getting to my Wife’s parents’ home. They had taken their stereo upstairs and had Bollywood music blaring. I caught a few kites while I was up there and also flew a couple of kites. It was a lot of fun. It was first time in 17 years I was in India on this day. My son came up on the roof and heard the music and started dancing. Roofs in India are flat and accessible by stairs. There must have been hundreds of kites at the same time in the sky, everyone in the neighborhood was on their roofs flying kites, listening to music and having a good time. I found flying kite was easier than I remember. When I was a kid it was a bit more difficult. Indians don't run and fly kites; that would be silly. There is no where to run on the roof; The wind must be about 5 mph to 10 mph which is nothing if you're from Chicago but everyone I talked to couldn't believe the awesome the wind was that day and how lucky they were to have it just for that day. It was middle of winter there but for me it was really hot, 85 to 90 degrees!

I had slept only four a few hours in last 48 hours so I decided to call it a day around 6pm and tried to get some sleep.

From Wikipedia:
Uttarayan, also known as Makarsakranti, is a kite-flying festival celebrated annually on January 14 in western India; it is a public holiday in Gujarat and Rajasthan. According to the Indian astronomy, Uttrayan is the day when the Sun moves to the northern hemisphere ("Uttar" means north, and "-ayan" means to go). This day also is celebrated as Pongal in southern India.

In the state of Gujarat, kite flying is considered an art. Kite fighting is a traditional Uttrayan activity: the kite flyer must keep his kite aloft while others to sever his thread using their own kites. When someone wins the kite fight, his group celerates with cheerful shouts of "Kade" and drum beatings. It is a common scene to see people dance and socialize freely.

Here is one of my son's picture on the roof on the first day. I'm making this blog pretty anonymous so you won't find any names or other personal pictures.