Spring

It is spring here, and I love it! The air is warmer, the flowers are blooming, the birds are singing and the wood stove was taken out of my art classroom. We have just reached the 6 week mark of school, and quarter break is just around the corner, so things are looking pretty good. The picture below shows my relief that winter is finished and that I am surviving teaching.


I have been working in the pottery studio quite a bit creating all sorts of things and trying to figure out how to mix a good glaze. It has been a long and frustrating process as with every firing the glaze doesn't melt quite right, but it has been a really good learning process. Below is a cup that I made that the glaze ran too much and whole bottom of the cup stuck to the kiln shelf. I guess this could be a bottomless cup of coffee.

This past weekend I went for my first long motorcycle adventure with a fellow teacher, we both had our own bikes. It was so good to be out on the windy roads in the sun with the snowy mountains in the distant. There was a women's Mela (festival) at town that was about an hour drive away so we decided to check it out.

Part of the Mela included a cultural programme which means different types of dancing. The thing that impressed me the most was the colours and pleats of the clothes that the women wore.

There were also little stalls set-up around the town square selling all sorts of cheap plastic gadgets and jewellery. I decided that I needed to get some bangles for my wrists, so these men helped me pick out some nice colours, the unfortunate thing was that they didn't fit, my hands are too wide. But, luckily I was in India and there is no such thing as doesn't fit when it involves making some money. So, the bangle man forced all kinds of colourful glass bangles onto my hands, it was a really painful experience. I didn't really like the colours (reds, yellows and blues) that he had choose, but I couldn't get them off so I had to pay for them. The picture below is only a glimpse of the bangle selection, you can see the shadow of boy looking at the colours.

Most of women that were at the Mela wore bright head coverings, long pleated skirts and blouses. The colours were beautiful and it was good to see so many women together enjoying the day in the sun. In all, it was a good weekend and I am glad that spring is here.