USA

I arrived in San Diego just in time for the last week of school for all of my sisters. It was so good to see them again! It is amazing how kids can get so much bigger and older looking in just six months. The first morning after I arrived in San Diego, I went to help out at my sister Malini's school. She had graduated from Kindergarten! I can't believe it! The kids had a pretty good last day at school, complete with a bounce house, a spin art machine and a cotton candy maker! Mom and I were put on cotton candy making duty, and I am glad mom was there to help me because I learned that I am a lousy cotton candy maker. I kept pressing the cotton candy too hard and it would mush into a little ball, and no matter what I did I seemed to get extremely sticky. There go my dreams of working at a carnival!

After that, Mom and the girls and I frantically rushed to the store to pick up snacks to take to Maya's class. They were celebrating her birthday and at a Montessori school that is an elaborate event. Mom had made a sheet of paper for each year of Maya's life, complete with a picture and a short paragraph of what had happened to her in that year. Mom read each paper and in between years, Maya would walk around in the circle of her classmates while everyone sang, "The Earth goes around the sun, tra la! The Earth goes around the sun!" Then they would ring a bell for the number of years of the age that they had just read. Very time consuming when you have just turned 11! That is a whole lot of circle walking and bell ringing! I think it does make the kids feel special, and that is the important thing, right? They do it for all the kids, so I guess it is a good thing that Montessori schools generally have a smaller class size.


Kindergarten Grad Malini with her Dadi