These are the days of miracle and wonder.

An hour ago when I left home for work, I felt pretty. I got a little more dressed up than usual in honour of Ganesh Chaturthi, a festival I don't celebrate that worships a God I don't believe in. I wore my pink and blue OMO kurta with a bright orange salwar (no, it looks good, honest!), used very dark kajal, wore my hair down despite the heat, wore bronze dangly earrings, and attracted compliments from everyone I met. A 28 minute train ride and 12 minute walk later, I feel like my skin has absorbed the myriad smells - ammonia, sewage, dead rats, rotten fish, cow dung- I encountered on my journey, and gone from being Medimix-clear to dermatological hell. Sweat and grime have encroached the nape of my neck, my scalp, my torso, and the eye make-up that usually brightens my face is just making me look stressed.

In short: Despite compulsive deodorization, hand sanitization, face-dabbing and water-splashing, Bombay makes me feel irreversibly ugly.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This morning, I got this e-mail:

Dear Aurina,

Cecilia Lipp here in the San Francisco office told me that you were trying to set up a telephone interviewwith her and then it didn't happen. She passed on your resume to me for a possible internship with the Amnesty International Film Festival.

I would like to know if you are intersted in applying for this internship and if so, I would like to try and set up a call. I am going to be away until Sept 18th, so it wouldhave to be after that date.

More information about the festival is on our website: www.amnestyusa.org/filmfest

Best wishes,Alessandra
------------------------------------------------------------------------
How cool is that?