The Farm

I went to a farm last Sunday. It is Sarayu and Samara's grandparents' farm. Sarayu and Samara were there along with their friends and parents and grandfather. It was fun to play with so many friends even though the grass was very ichy. 

We watched some TV at the caretaker Bagyamma's home. She has many pets including a dog, chickens and guinea pigs. I tried to feed the guinea pigs but they did not eat the food. 

I then explored the farm with my friends. There are lots of trees in the farm. There are coconuts, teaks, chikoos, sitafals, chilies, beans and so many other trees growing there. Wild animals such as elephants and monkeys visit the farm. The monkeys love visiting there. At night a lepord or a jaguar comes to the farm and leaves at day. There is a snake that lives beneath the ground in the farm. 

There are lots of bugs. I saw a praying mantis, a ladybug, spiders, flies, a grasshopper and worst of all Mosquitos. Luckily I had repellent on so they couldn't do a number on me.

We played a role play game. The oldest one (a girl) was the queen the other three girls were princesses and I was the knight. There were evil kingdoms and another good kingdom. I belonged to the good kingdom.

Me protecting the good kingdom with my bow and arrow
and the princesses being silly.

We started a picnic. There were noodles, sausages, pasta, potato salad and too many bugs to let us finish it. 

The girls are going to move to the farm at some point so I can visit the farm often (and use up all our mosquito repellent).

Diwali

Every year there is a festival called Diwali. It happens at the end of October or early November. This year, it started on October 22. It's a big festival in India. It's like Christmas and 4th of July combined. People gift each other and families get together and eat big meals. People eat lots of sweets (such as laddus and burfis) on Diwali. People also burst firecrackers for 4 days - at least. We only burst firecrackers for 2 days because we were being responsible for the environment.

We were gifted by my friend Siddharth's mom, and the people that live diagonal from us gifted us. So we were gifted by everyone on the seventh floor. My grandmother also gifted me.

There was a big meal at my house on October 23 or 24. Sarayu and Samara (my cousins) came, their grandparents came, my grandmother came, her friends Daniela and Anil came, and my dad's sister Nita came the day before. 

We dressed up in traditional clothes. 
    

We decorated the house with flowers, rangolis, lamps and other diwali decorations.

Nita made rangolis made out of flowers.

Me and Sarayu and Samara helped make puris. Sarayu and Samara made balls from the dough.

My grandmother rolled them into flat circles.

I took the circles a few at a time to the kitchen to my mom and Nita

They fried them.

 The yummy puris were ready. We had a big lunch.

I ate a lot of laddus and barfis.

My cousins and I read a Chota Bheem book with Daniela. I like Chota Bheem. 

 We lit the lamps in the night.

Finally we bursted fireworks and firework rockets. 

The Picnic

I went to a picnic on October 11 with other kids and their families. It was fun!!!!!!!!!!!

The picnic was in a huge park called Cubbon park. It is more like a forest then a park. There were big trees everywhere. There were some tamarind trees and tamarind fruit had fallen on the ground. I tasted a small piece. It was very very sour. The weather was cloudy and muggy. The ground was slightly wet from rains.

Cubbon Park



Tamarind flower

Tamarind fruit

The first thing that me and the other kids did was go on a nature walk. We found many interesting things such as interesting and yellow flowers, 3 leaf and 4 leaf clovers, a twig that had another twig coming out if it, and something that looked like a bamboo stick. At the end of the picnic we painted using the things we found during the nature walk. I painted lava drops and gold raining on a plains biome. I also painted the results of the lava and gold rain. I lost one of my two paintings. :(

There was also an obstacle course. The first part of the obstacle course was to measure a jumprope with your feet, the second part was to run around the numbered trees in order, the third part was to kick a socer ball (foot ball) to my friend Seth's older brother Cade, the fourth part  was to do a thing called the Army Crawl, and the last part was to hit two balloons hanging from a tree with our fists.

Seth's dad showed us how to pitch a tent. He taught us how to hammer in the tent pegs. He also taught us how to attach the canvas to the peg. Once the tent was done everyone went inside the tiny tent - except for me.

We played many fun games. We played socer (football) and badminton.There were lemon spoon races. In a lemon spoon race, you have to put a spoon in your mouth and put a lemon on the spoon. The first person to reach the finish line without dropping the lemon is the winner of the race. We also played cops and robbers. I was one of the cops. There were only two robbers and three to six cops. So each cop did not much chance to catch a robber.

 

We played a game called Star. We each have four pieces of folded paper. We unfold them and if we have the same pieces of paper, we say star. You can't let anyone else see your paper. The first person to say star puts his hand on the ground. The others need to quickly say star and put their hands on top of the first person's hand. The first person gets the most points and the closer your hands are the clouds, the less points you get.

 

When it was lunch time we had a big lunch I had a roast beef sandwich, mango juice, vada pav,cucumbers and watermelons salad, and different types of rice. For dessert, there were chocolate chip cookies, brownies and lemon cake. The food was yummy. My favorite was the brownie.

 

All about Pokemon!

There is a series called Pokémon. It is my favorite series so I desided to write a post about pokemon. There are several Pokémon types.

1. Fire
2. Water
3. Grass
4. Electric
5. Flying
6. Ground
7. Poison
8. Bug
9. Normal
10. Fairy
11. Fighting
12. Psychic
13. Rock
14. Ice
15. Ghost
16. Steel
17. Dragon
18. Dark
19. ??? (Mystery?)

Certain types of Pokémon can evolve into other Pokémon. Pikachus can't evolve into Charmeleons. Pikachus can only evolve into Riachus. Riachus can't evolve into anything. Certain types of Pokémon can learn certain attacks. http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/List_of_moves.

There are Unevolved Pokémon, Evolution One Pokémon and Final Pokémon (Evolution Two Pokémon). Final Pokémon are at their final stage. They can't evolve. Evolution One Pokémon can only evolve once into Final Pokémon. Unevolved Pokémon can evolve into Evolution One Pokémon.

Unevolved Pokémon can be starter Pokémon (the first Pokémon you get). The three starter Pokémon are 1. Squirtle 2. Bulbasaur and 3. Charmander. Squirtle evolves into Watortle, Bulbasaur evolves into Ivysaur, and Charmander evolves into Charmeleon. The starter Pokémon's final stages are Blastoise, Venusaur and Charizard respectively.

http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/List_of_Pok%C3%A9mon_by_National_Pok%C3%A9dex_number

There are a group of very rare and powerful pokemon called legendary pokemon. There are 6 generations: generation 1 (generation I), generation 2 (generation II), generation 3, (generation III)
generation 4 (generation IV), generation 5 (generation V) and generation 6(generation VI).

Pokémon called Pikachu; his name is Speakachu
 

Not a Pokémon

Also not a Pokémon

The Bombe Hubba - The Dussera festival doll display

There is a big festival in India every year called Dussehra. In some parts of India, there is a festival called the Bombe Hubba (doll festival) as part of Dussehra and Navratri. I  learnt how to add links to my blog and have included links about these festivals.

I hosted a bombe hubba with my cuzins in their home. I made some things for the doll display. I made a Lego plane and put a Lego man on it. The plane was hung from a ceiling lamp so it looked like it was flying on top of the display.  I also made a mountain monster out of clay. He fought 3 or 4 Goddesses and 1 God. The Lego men were also fighting the Goddesses and God. The mountain monster's name is Everest. If he was real, he would be 54,00,000 feet tall.

The hubba was fun. I made 3 rangolis.  I ate many laddus. They were yummy. Some of my friends came to see the bombes (dolls) and I played with them. I played with my friend Seth. After he left, I played with my cuzins. We had a pillow fight. A few people got hurt so the pillow fight stopped.

After my friends left, I watched 2 videos. They were pony videos. There were 5 girls and only one boy (me) at that time and I did not get to chose any of the videos. This made me sad. If I did choose, we would have watched the Diamond Minecart Minecraft videos.
  

Everything was lit up.

There were flowers everywhere.
Everyone decorated their cars
and homes. We did too.



My rangolis are the ones at the bottom.

Me making rangolis



One of the displays with my plane flying over it.

My grandmom is stringing flowers.

Yummy laddus and chickpeas
and flowers my gradmother strung.

The monster I made is the one
with the green tail

Decorations. My cuzins colored them.

The elephants were made and decorated by my cuzins

A display of an Indian wedding



Watching the videos

This is called haldi and kumkuma
and is applied on the forehead

I'm tired after a looong and fun day.






 














 

Jokes and other stuff

I lost a tooth. This is the fifth tooth that I lost. The tooth fairy came and gave me Rs.100 (1 dollar and 70 cents). Again I did not see her. I think her magic fairy dust keeps us asleep and wears out only after she is gone. I think she is an Indian tooth fairy because she gave rupees, not dollars.

I and my cousins went to a book store called Atta Galatta. They had a toy workshop. I made 3 toys and I learnt the science behind them. The first toy I made was a climbing dragon. I stuck straws on the back of the dragon's wings and pulled a long thread through each straw piece. When you pull the thread from the bottom of the straws, the thread rubs against straws. So it creates friction which makes the dragon climb the thread.


Me in Atta Galatta

The next toy I made - I have no idea what it is called. I'll just call it The Sheep and The Grass. I drew a sheep on one paper and grass on another paper. I stuck the papers on the two sides of a cardboard. I punched two holes on the two sides of the cardboard. I strung a thread through the holes. When I turned the thread, the cardboard spun, and when it slowed down, it looked like the sheep were in the grass. The science behind this is that your eyes store images for a few seconds before transferring it to the brain. So it looks like the sheep were in the grass.

The third toy I made was a catapult. They didn't really explain how a catapult worked. I think they ran out of time.

The toys I made

I like making up jokes. I have made up a lot of jokes. These are some of my favorites.

1. What do pineapples wear instead of glasses? Pinoculars

Mr. Pineapple

2. What is a fire monster's favorite fruit? Water"melt"on

Flamey, the fire monster eating water-melt-on in his magma house

3. What did the bell say to the other bell when he did a good job? Bell done

4. What was the first thing the spider did on his computer? Create a "web"site.

Mr. Spider Monster

5. What did the chicken say to all the other meat? Come tomorrow for our meating.

6. What did May say to June? "May" I borrow one of your holidays?

7. What is a cactus monster's favorite part of a meal? The desert.